Code Survival: Champions of Survival
by I heart Lyoko
Summary: Family. It's always been important to a great many people... But when the world falls apart, how important will that be to the members of the Moretti crime family? Will these mobsters stay loyal and truthful to each other? Will they be their own champions of survival? Or will the WALKING DEAD claim them? (Part of the Code: Survival series.)
1. The Death of Frank Romano

**(I DO NOT own The Walking Dead, Code Lyoko, or any names/brands that might appear in the story. Any references to any person living or dead is merely a coincidence, and should NOT be taken as intentional. All of that being said, I hope you enjoy the story!**

* * *

It was a cold and rainy night throughout most of upper New York State. Everyone was going about their daily business that night, everyone was going out to do whatever it was they were out to do... including the criminals as well. On the shore of Lake Ontario discreetly set away from the other more-busy places near Rochester, a lone black car sat parked near an old and unmaintained pier long since forgotten by most. It was quiet. It was discrete. And no one would come looking for anything over here.

Three men in fancy suits and ties were standing near the car, with two standing at the trunk and the third rummaging inside of the back seats. The man rummaging in the back seats pulled out a large aluminum baseball bat while the other two men opened up the trunk. Inside the trunk was a bruised, bloody and beaten man who was tied up. His right eye was so swollen that he couldn't even see the men who had kidnapped him from the streets of Brooklyn several hours earlier, but even so he knew exactly who they were... A gag was inside of his mouth so he couldn't ask or say anything. He was completely at their mercy.

"Boys, get Frankie outta the trunk! It's time to end this..." the first man, 'Ray', barked an order at his two underbosses.

The two men did exactly as Ray ordered them to. Michael Beneventi and Henry De Luca have been working with their don Ray Moretti for years now and they've actually been friends with Ray since they were all young kids living in Bath Beach together, and for their loyalty and friendship throughout their lives Ray christened them both as high-ranking underbosses when he took charge of the Moretti Family after the death of his father. So naturally they were both very used to doing all sorts of illegal things over the course of their whole lives.

The only real problem that they had at the moment was a man named Frank Romano.

Frank had been with the Moretti Family for the last five or six years and to be fair he had done a pretty decent job doing their dirty work throughout New York City. Mostly he did things such as intimidate store owners into paying protection money to the Family, rough up some deadbeats who owed the Family debt money, eliminate people whom the Family decided needed to be eliminated... those kind of things.

Frank had earned quite a reputation throughout the criminal underworld of New York and about a year ago he was even christened as a made man, a _soldato_, for his efforts. But last week the Family found out from some very reliable sources that Frank had been doing some very alarming things.

As of late, Frank had apparently started to publicly brag about many of the illegal activities that he did for the Family as if it was the most normal thing a person could do. Like washing your fucking car, or taking your dog for a walk. Even worse, the Family had also heard from the same reliable sources that feds of the New York Police Department were beginning to notice Frank's loud mouth: sparking a police investigation into him and his associates.

Frank truthfully didn't mean anything by his blabbering. Hell, he was just trying to use his horrible ego to impress some cheap women into fucking his brains out back at his apartment, ain't no one can blame him for wanting to get laid. But unfortunately, because of what he was saying, the Moretti Family had decided that he was now far more of a liability than an asset. He was simply a threat to their very way of life.

If Frank was picked up by the feds for everything he was saying, then what would happen if he turned state's and decided to squeal about everything else he knew about Mr. Moretti or his associates? What would happen to the Family at large if he told the wrong people about the countless things he's done for the Moretti Family? It was too risky of a possibility. The Family couldn't afford him leaking their secrets whether intentionally or not.

The Moretti's got all of the authorization they needed from the rest of the Commission for what they were about to do to Frank Romano. No one was going to question what was to happen, literally none of the other families would give the slightest of shits, and Frank certainly didn't have anyone left in his life who would care too much if he suddenly disappeared...

It is what it is.

Ray shut the door to his car after he leaned out of the backseat, casually setting the aluminum bat on his shoulder. Mike and Henry pulled Frank out of the trunk and they dragged him out onto the concrete ground a short distance from the front of the car's headlights, the captive grunting with frustration and a feeling of pain since he couldn't resist. Ray smirked as Mike and Henry forced Frank onto his knees, making him crouch in front of the don so they could look each other in the eyes.

"Hey, hey... Frankie, _relax..._ It is _good_ to see you tonight." Ray said, full of sarcasm. "You worked with us for a while now... What was it? Five years now, right? Six? Somethin' like that? But now all of that's been thrown away because you just couldn't keep your fuckin' mouth shut..." he suddenly frowned.

Frank quietly whimpered a little when Ray raised the bat and rubbed it against the side of his skull so he could feel how solid it was. Frank was afraid... _very_ afraid. Don Moretti was famous in the New York criminal underworld for his golden rule: never kill anyone unless you have a legitimately good reason to do so. Killing was a matter which Ray always considered to be both serious and solemn. Ending a life was only a last resort for the Moretti Family in most cases.

However, Frank realized that he had given Ray a pretty damn good reason for Ray to end his life. He was just praying he could find some way to get out of this alive...

Ray then hit Frank in his stomach with the end of his baseball bat pretty hard. Frank coughed violently as he fell onto his side, cringing and feeling pain all over his abdomen and stomach. But even so, this pain would be nothing compared to what he was sure he would be feeling in a few brief minutes... Henry and Mike then walked over and tied a pair of cement blocks to Frank's ankles with some lines of strong rope, causing Frank's eyes to widen with even more fear.

Mike and Henry lifted Frank back up onto his knees and Ray went to crouch in front of him, giving him a sinister smirk. According to Ray, the worst thing that anyone on this Earth could do was commit an act of betrayal against any person who is loyal to you. By blabber-mouthing and putting the entire Family at risk, Frank did just that in Ray's eyes. Such an act simply could not stand without restitution.

Never kill anyone unless you have a good reason to do so, right?

"You know, I actually trusted ya with my life, Frank..." Ray began with a sigh. "You were a good earner. A good soldato (_soldier_). And you were family... Fuck, I even _made_ you myself! I made you into a _made man! _I gave you _power!"_ he exasperated.

With an angered sigh, Ray turned his back to Frank and he pinched the bridge of his nose. He was so disappointed in Frank's actions... After six years of loyalty from Frank even Ray was surprised that it all led to this moment.

"But I guess that didn't mean shit to ya, right?" Ray accused, turning back to the captive mobster. "You just wanted to get some stupefacente (_amazing_) pussy and fifteen minutes of fame! You just didn't give a shit about the Family..." he accused with a glare.

The captive mobster just whimpered as a reply to these statements. He was truly afraid for his life... Ray, however angry he was, was enjoying every bit of this situation. This fucker was gonna get everything he deserves and nothing less._ No one_ goes against their way of life, the code of omertà. Not even made men.

"But here's what I'm gonna do for you, Frank." Ray said to his former soldato, patting Frank on his shoulder and causing him to flinch in terror. "I _WILL_ make you famous just like how you wanted to be. I owe ya that much, buddy..."

Famous...? No, no, he didn't want to be famous...

What was Ray getting at...?

"I guess you wanted to be on the front page for the city papers, or somethin' right? You wanted to be all over the news? The internet? Well, I can help with that." Ray smirked. "_'Brooklyn mobster Frank Romano declared missing and presumed dead!'_" he suddenly announced a hypothetical headline for tomorrow's paper back in New York City.

That's when Frank started to scream with utter realization. Ray had just signed his death warrant and there was nothing he could do about it. _He was dead!_ He was gonna get fucking whacked! _WHACKED!_ Frank tried to beg Don Moretti to let him live but alas the gag in his mouth made sure he couldn't say a word. All he could do was scream, scream, and scream some more.

Henry and Mike were both laughing at Frank's reaction to his fate. They truly thought it was hilarious to see this scumbag screaming for his life. They only laughed harder when they saw that Frank apparently urinated in his pants out of fear...

"Hey, look! He's screaming with joy, boss!" Henry sarcastically joked to his boss.

"Frankie, I'm jealous!_ I really am!_ You're gonna be as famous as Jimmy Hoffa!" Mike laughed, full of sarcasm but being completely literal about the Hoffa reference.

Ray was also laughing as he suddenly raised his bat and gave some very hard hits to Frank's kneecaps. Within moments both of Frank's kneecaps were shattered and the captive mobster was now screaming in unbearable agony as well as fear. The cement blocks were tied, Frank's hands were bound, and his kneecaps were basically powder at this point. There was nothing stopping the three mobsters from dumping their former soldato into the lake and he certainly wouldn't be able to escape from the water in such a state.

Simply put: Frank Romano was fucked.

"Get him to the edge of the pier and toss those blocks into the water, but keep him up here for another minute or two. I wanna speak to him before we send him off." Ray instructed his two cronies.

Mike and Henry grabbed Frank from under his shoulders and they dragged him to the edge of the pier. Frank was struggling and wailing the entire time, but with his hands binded and his legs broken there wasn't really much he could do. The two men kept a tight hold on Frank as they forced him up onto his broken knees, making him wail with even more agony as Ray crouched down to look him in the eyes.

"Hai rotto il tuo giuramento di omertà, Frankie. È un crimine che non può essere perdonato._ (You broke your oath of omertà__, Frankie. It is a crime that cannot be forgiven.)_" Ray smugly told his former soldato.

Frank watched with fear as Mike and Henry kicked the cement blocks into the water, the plopping sounds only adding onto his screams of agony and utter horror. He was about to die... Ray gave a nod to his two men and they began to drag Frank towards the edge of the pier until they were holding him directly above the deep water. Frank could only look Ray in the eyes, seeing the feeling of satisfaction the mafia don had within them.

"Possa Dio stesso avere pietà della tua anima. _(May God himself have mercy on your soul.)_" Ray said as a goodbye to Frank Romano.

And then Mike and Henry let go. Frank's muffled screams were immediately silenced as he fell into the water. The three mobsters peeked over the side of the pier to look at Frank struggling in the water, and they stuck around for a few more moments to witness the air bubbles rising out of the water. Unsurprisingly, it wasn't long before the air bubbles ceased and his life finally came to a premature end. All they could see now was the corpse of a dead mobster staring back at them through the murky waters of Lake Ontario.

The three mobsters felt absolutely no sympathy for their former friend, and after Ray gave one last insult by spitting into the water the three began to head back to their car... Their task was completed, and now it was time to just head back home.

_It is what it is._

* * *

After managing to make their way down through the state the three mobsters finally made it back to the outskirts of NYC. They drove through the heavy traffic in Manhattan and they were finally beginning to approach their home borough: Brooklyn. As Henry drove their car along the Brooklyn Bridge, Mike was absent-mindedly staring out of the passenger window while Ray laid in the backseat focused on a crossword book he picked up at a gas station somewhere in western Pennsylvania.

Henry got them through the bridge and he drove into an exit-ramp. There was still a bit of traffic but since it was still before dawn it wasn't anything like in Lower Manhattan or Jersey. Hopefully they'll be back home within the hour, but he wouldn't be surprised if they ran into a traffic snarl along the way. Ray didn't really give a shit when he got home as he had taken care of everything he needed to do that day, and if there was anything important he was sure his consigliere could handle it back at the house.

Ray chewed on the eraser end of his pencil and stared down at the crossword in deep thought, trying to figure out a word that just simply wasn't coming into his mind. He _loved_ crosswords ever since he was a young child. They always helped him to keep his mind active when it should be, and half the time it seemed like he'd buy crossword books by the pound. Plus it made for a damn good hobby.

"Boys, what a five letter word for: '_a pooch living in 2062'_? It's part of the film and television category." Ray asked his two underbosses, as he was wondering if either of them could help him answer this question.

Henry blinked at the strange question and he had absolutely no idea what could be the answer to such a thing. But Mike, the movie and TV show aficionado that he was, simply shrugged and turned to look back at his boss with a know-it-all grin plastered on his face.

"._._..._._..is it:_ 'Astro'_, boss?" Mike guessed an answer that he had a good feeling about.

Ray experimentally wrote down_ 'Astro'_ under the empty space, and sure enough it fit perfectly. Satisfied, Ray thanked his underboss for the help and then he continued trying to figure out whatever the last two remaining answers were. Henry continued to drive the car through the streets of Brooklyn, and in a sign that he was back in familiar territory he looked out the window and saw Mama Moretti's: the Italian bistro restaurant and bar which Ray's mother Carmela used to run before she died about a decade ago. It was Ray's property now according to her will, but he still kept the name of the place the same as a way to honor her.

Turning down the street which led to the Moretti compound, Henry couldn't help but think back on what had happened to Frank. He felt that the motherfucker got exactly what he deserved, but truthfully? In his honest opinion? They could've handled the execution a lot better. And certainly they could've gotten rid of the body a little better too...

Anyway, it wasn't his job to go against Ray's decisions. Henry was an underboss, Ray was the don. Underbosses simply don't go against their dons. It is what it is... Henry shook his head and he decided to just stop thinking about Ray's decision-making or that fucker Frank Romano. That fucking guy wasn't even worth thinking about in the first place.

Henry drove his way through Brooklyn until he got to Jefferson Avenue in Bedford-Stuyvesant, and he saw that he saw he was approaching the Moretti compound. Ray set down his crossword book on the seat next to him and he straightened his tie as Henry parked the car in front of the building, all three men taking a good look at the place. The compound was a brownstone row house located deep within Moretti territory, and since 1966 it has served as the de-facto national headquarters for the entire Moretti organization. Whether you were in Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Chicago, Detroit, Toronto, St. Louis, Miami, New York or Timbuk-fucking-tu then you, as a member of the Moretti Family, were obligated to get your orders from the made men who in turn got their own orders from the guy who called this building home.

By and large the place appeared pretty normal to anyone who happened to look at it, but Moretti gunmen were throughout the entire borough and there was several guards just on Jefferson Avenue alone: all of whom had pistols or sub-machine guns underneath their jackets. Although the Moretti Family was a bit smaller than other famed families like the Colombos or the Luccheses, they still had plenty of firepower and plenty of good men working under Ray's leadership.

One of the guards standing at the front door came to the car and he opened the back door for Mr. Moretti. Ray climbed out of the back seat as Henry and Mike got out of the front, and the two underbosses followed close behind their don as he walked up the front steps of his home. Killing Frank Romano had to be done but the five hour drive to Lake Ontario and the five hour drive back to Brooklyn was a huge pain in the ass for all involved. The extra few hours there and back where they were stuck in traffic didn't help either.

"Lucy's probably sleeping so try to keep quiet..." Ray informed his two underbosses since his wife was usually asleep around this time.

The two mobsters nodded at their don's request. Taking off his shoes and leaving them by the front door, Ray appeared to be pretty relaxed as he walked into his home. Henry and Mike left their shoes next to Ray's as the mafia don headed straight into the living room, where he plopped down on his chair and put on the television. He was absolutely exhausted and he just wanted to catch up on the news a little before he went upstairs to get some sleep.

"Christ, what a day..." Ray sighed as he turned on his TV, trying to relax a bit.

Mike and Henry were just as exhausted as Ray was, so it wouldn't be long until they decided to head back to their own apartments to get some sleep too. But like Ray they wanted to chill out and relax a little bit before they headed home. Luckily their apartments weren't too far away from the Moretti compound, so the drive there would be pretty easy and hopefully pretty quick. They had to get some shuteye tonight since they had even more business to attend to for the Family tomorrow...

The three heard the front door open and shut again. Turning to see who it was, the three mobsters saw Sam was walking into the house. For the last thirty years Sam Occhino has been the consigliere for the Moretti Family, loyally serving right under the don. First it was to Ray's father Ennio, and since his death Sam's answered to Ray himself. He was a damn good man for the job and the Family has prospered time and time again due to his work. In many ways his voice was considered to be almost an equal to Don Moretti himself. He earned that himself.

"Sam, come va? Come sono andate le cose nel Queens? _(Sam, how are you? How'd that business in Queens go?)"_ Ray asked his consigliere.

"Eh, avrebbe potuto andare meglio. _(Eh, it could've gone better.)"_ Sam sighed, speaking in the only language he knew.

"Beh, dimmi di quello che è successo. _(Well, tell me about what happened.)_" Ray replied with a tired voice. He did NOT have the energy for more business today, so he was just praying that whatever happened in Queens could be easily dealt with sometime tomorrow.

Sam could tell that his don appeared pretty worn out after that business he had to deal with up in Rochester, and he started to feel a little bad for the guy. He cared a lot for this kid ever since he was... well, a kid. Sam was very good friends with his father and in many ways he was kind of an uncle to Ray when he was growing up, but no matter what he felt the Moretti Family always had to come first and foremost for everyone who was in it.

"Conosci quel club del sesso? Quello su a Jamaica? _(You know that sex club? The one up in Jamaica?)_" Sam inquired to Ray as he sat down between Mike and Henry.

"Sì, certo che lo so. 'Sinner's Palace.' _(Yeah, of course I do. 'Sinner's Palace.')_" Ray shrugged. "Il proprietario ha accettato i nostri termini? _(Did the owner agree to our terms?)"_

Sam shook his head. "No. _(No.)_" he began to say. "Si è rifiutato di vendere e mi ha detto di andarsene altrimenti avrebbe chiamato la polizia. _(He refused to sell, and he told me to leave or else he would have called the police.)"_

Ray leaned his head back against the back of the sofa and he let out an annoyed groan. For the last three months the Moretti Family had been trying to get that sex club in Brooklyn's Jamaica district under their prostitution ring. It was a popular place for countless horny john's in Brooklyn and it had the potential to make the Family a lot of money, but there was just one problem with it: the owner.

For whatever reason the guy just simply kept refusing over and over again to sell the business over to the Family, even when the offers grew more and more lucrative. Ray had no idea who he was since dealing with unwilling owners was usually Sam's line of work, but if the bastard kept this up then he'd have to send Mike and Henry. And if he sent Mike and Henry, then the guy's brains could very well end up as a splatter on a wall somewhere.

"Sam, questo sta sfuggendo di mano e tu lo sai. _(Sam, this is getting out of hand and you know it.)_" Ray stated to the consigliere.

"Ho provato tutto quello che mi veniva in mente, ma il cazzo non si muoveva. _(I've tried everything I could think of but the prick just won't budge.)_" Sam said, pinching the bridge of his nose in frustration at the situation.

"Bene, forse ora è il momento di inviare le armi grosse. Ricordare..._ (Well, maybe now's the time to send in the big guns. Remind...)_"

Ray trailed off from his words as he tried to think of what the name of the owner was. He had no clue why but for some reason it seemed like forgot the fucker's name each and every time it came up in conversation. It was growing tiresome... normally he wasn't the type of guy to forget a name.

"...Sam, come si chiamava di nuovo il ragazzo? _(...Sam, what was the guy's name again?)"_ Ray sheepishly asked.

"Campbell. George Campbell." Sam replied with an amused chuckle. "Da quello che ho raccolto le sue ragazze lo chiamano: 'La Volpe.' _(From what I have collected his girls call him: 'The Fox.')"_ he further added.

"What a stupid fuckin' name..." Mike commented in English with a roll of his eyes.

The Moretti don looked down towards the coffee table and he began to think of ways to try and convince the guy to sell. They couldn't kill him since it would've hit the revenue the place generated, and it was obvious that Sam's negotiations wasn't working either. Maybe now was the time to send in the big guns...

"Mike? Henry? _Change of plans..._" Ray began to inform his two friends. "That thing I asked you to do tomorrow in Yonkers? I'm gonna get someone else to handle it. Probably Derek or Vinnie 'Ice Pick' or someone... I want you two to head to Sinner's Palace and I want you to deal with the Fox yourselves. Make him see reason, but _don't_ kill him. Right now he's more valuable to me alive than dead." he instructed.

"You got it, Ray..." Henry said with a nod.

Ray appeared a bit more relaxed. "Good. One less thing for me to worry about..." he sighed.

Sam, Mike and Henry all nodded as Ray turned his attention back over towards his television. He flipped through a bunch of channels and passed on watching things like a few children's cartoons, a Subdigitals music video, some documentary on the Statue of Liberty, a congressional report on the state of the economy that month... Y'know, just a ton of really boring shit which wouldn't interest him in a million years.

Eventually Ray got to the channel showing the evening news and he set the remote down on the arm of his chair. He saw that some American reporter was standing in... wait, where the fuck was that? Moscow? Ray had to keep the volume low so he wouldn't wake his wife, but he and the other mobsters in the room listened as closely as possible to the TV since they were all curious to see if anything happened over there.

The reporter still looked professional and calm despite the number of police officers which could be seen throughout the background.

"-and we're back to Emily Woodward reporting live from Moscow's Red Square... Emily?" they heard a news anchor as the news apparently just came back from commercial.

"Thanks Chet." the reporter replied, taking it away. "To add on to what we were saying earlier, the Russian government has officially declared a nation-wide quarantine of all flights and ships heading in or out of the country. Apparently this is due to the reports of the sudden, fast-moving virus coming out from Siberia over the last four days." she explained.

Virus? What virus? They hadn't heard anything about a virus...

"Although Moscow has not reported any official deaths as of tonight, the number of infected is said to be growing into the hundreds and rumors persist that the number of dead has topped well over 100. So far no state officials are confirming these reports, however." the reporter continued.

"And what of the persistent rumors of acts of cannibalism being committed by infected persons? And the social media blackout the Russian president ordered throughout the country earlier this morning?" the anchor inquired.

"Chet, all I can offer at this time is speculation and hearsay. So far I have heard nothing to confirm or deny any of those rumors or-"

Sam suddenly took the remote from Ray's chair and he turned off the TV before the reporters could continue. Although Ray appeared pretty annoyed, he realized that Sam was probably right in turning the damn thing off. Some stupid little coughs and sniffles 6,000 miles away wasn't gonna be a threat to the Moretti Family or anyone in it, so it was best to not even be concerned about it. Even so, Ray needed to get away from the TV and get some sleep anyway.

"Well, boys... I'm gonna call it a night." Ray yawned as he got up out of his chair, stretching his arms up.

"Alright. We'll handle Sinner's Palace tomorrow..." Henry nodded as he got up to grab his shoes.

Mike looked over at the elderly consigliere as he put his suit jacket back on. "Sam, hai bisogno di un passaggio per tornare a casa tua? _(Sam, do you need a lift back to your place?)"_

"L'ho coperto, ma grazie comunque, ragazzo. _(I've got it covered, but thanks anyway, kid.)_" Sam replied with a shrug as he hobbled towards the front door with his cane.

The underboss nodded as he watched Sam walk out the front door. As he went to get his shoes on, Ray bid them both goodnight and he started heading back up the stairs to his and Lucy's bedroom. Henry and Mike were just as exhausted as the don was so they were pretty anxious to get out of Ray's home and back over to their apartments. The two underbosses returned a goodnight to Ray before they left to head home.

The don himself quietly got to the third floor of the row house and he inched his way to his bedroom. Trying his hardest to not wake his wife, Ray quietly entered their bedroom to see she was peacefully sleeping in their bed. Ray tiredly took off his clothes and he changed into a t-shirt and boxers, and then he laid down next to her as softly and quietly as humanly possible.

Ray laid on his side and he took in his wife's sleeping appearance. Out of instinct he brushed a hair out from the front of her face and gazed at her beauty for who knew how long. Ray and Lucy have been happily married for the last ten years and he still thought of her as the prettiest girl in all of New York City...

Closing his eyes, Ray sighed and pulled the covers over himself and he tried to get some much-needed sleep.

He still had plenty of more business that he'd have to deal with tomorrow...


	2. Luck of the Irish

**(I DO NOT own The Walking Dead, Code Lyoko, or any names/brands that might appear in the story. Any references to any person living or dead is merely a coincidence, and should NOT be taken as intentional.)**

* * *

A couple of days after Frank Romano's murder, Mike and Henry were walking down Liberty Avenue in Jamaica after finding a spot to park Henry's car. The two met up earlier that morning for some breakfast and some coffee at a diner they both liked and then they set out for Sinner's Palace to deal with the buyer situation with its owner, George Campbell. The two weren't really sure what to expect from the Fox, but Mike was packing a loaded snub-nosed revolver just as a precaution.

Mike wasn't planning on using his piece to kill the Fox since Ray specifically stated he wanted him alive, but a gun was certainly a good tool to scare someone shitless and no matter how simple a job seemed to be he always, _always_ kept a gun with him. The only problem that Mike and Henry were having at the moment was actually _finding_ Sinner's Palace...

The two mobsters walked and walked and walked but they couldn't find the damn place anywhere. Street after street, building after building, everything was so unfamiliar and even a tiny bit alien to them. Hell, they couldn't even call Sam for the address they were looking for because Mike accidentally left his cell at home and the battery on Henry's phone was dead.

"Shit, you see the place anywhere?" Henry inquired as they checked the fronts of every building they walked past.

"Nope. I don't usually come out this way. None of this is familiar to me..." Mike replied as he also searched the buildings.

"Same here... Christ, of all the days to forget a fucking address..." Henry grumbled to himself as they stopped at a street corner.

Henry and Mike were both getting more and more annoyed by this searching, but they pressed on since this was something they had to do for Ray. The two kept walking for block after block but they couldn't find the damn place anywhere. Eventually they wandered into the more-seedy areas around Guy R. Brewster Boulevard and they finally realized that they were completely lost.

The two mobsters kept walking for a bit until they finally decided to ask for directions. There wasn't a shitload of people on the street that morning but at the corner to 109th Avenue they saw an unattractive woman on the corner who was very obviously some sort of a prostitute. Their mothers (God rest their souls) had always told them to avoid women such as this, but since Mike and Henry were getting a little desperate they decided to take the risk of asking her for directions. What could go wrong...?

The prostitute noticed the two mobsters approaching and she flashed a seductive grin towards them. "Hey boys... You two studs lookin' for some fun today? My rates are ten bucks for handjobs, twenty bucks for oral, fifty for pussy, and a hundred for shoving it up my-"

"**_NO!_**" Henry quickly stopped her in mid-sentence. "No, no, no, no,no,no,no,no! Fuck no... _no thanks!_ We- uh... sorry, but... _fuck, we're not here for any of that!_" he made sure to say, stammering a bit since he was a bit taken aback by the woman's offers.

"We need help finding a place and we're a bit lost... you think you could help us? We've been walking for a while and we can't find the place anywhere. Does 'Sinner's Palace' ring any bells to you?" Mike asked the lady.

The prostitute seemed to be pretty annoyed by Henry and Mike's rejection of her offers for paid sex. Offended, even. Deciding not to help either of them for the "insult" which she believed she had received, she just gave them both the middle finger and she began to walk away to find some other guy who'd be a more-willing customer. Knowing the john's in Jamaica she knew she wouldn't have to look for very long...

"You don't know what you're missing, pendejos!_ (assholes!) _My pussy is the best on the block!" the prostitute loudly announced so that everyone on the street could hear. "I could've sucked both your cocks so hard that neither of ya'd walk for a fuckin' week! Little-dick bitches like you two greaseballs ain't enough for a la puta _(slut)_ like me!" she yelled back at the two men.

Mike and Henry immediately felt many eyes looking their way, and since the prostitute had succeeded in embarrassing them a bit they decided to just try to ignore the stares and keep heading down the street and keep looking for Sinner's Palace. Naturally, the two just hoped to God that they wouldn't run into someone as crazy as that woman ever again. Their mothers (God rest their souls) were absolutely right.

As they walked, Mike glanced back around his shoulder and saw that the crazy prostitute had already found another guy to solicit for sex, but this time she seemed to have succeeded since she suddenly started leading the guy around a building and into an alley to the side of it. Mike felt a sense of pity for whoever that poor bastard was since he had no idea what he was getting himself into... both figuratively and literally.

Mike turned to look back at Henry and he bumped his shoulder against him to get his attention. When Henry looked at his friend, Mike smirked.

"..._._..._._Henry, I think that lady needs Jesus." Mike couldn't help but comment.

Henry slugged Mike in the arm and groaned at the shitty joke, causing Mike to laugh as they kept walking. Hopefully they'll find Sinner's Palace and not have any more distractions today...

* * *

Ray had a pretty big grin on his face as he spun some pizza dough in his hands. Business was always pretty good at Mama Moretti's during any given day of the week, but since a Yankees game was on today there was much more customers than usual. Pizza, beer, and baseball was almost as important to the people of Brooklyn as bread, air and water, and Ray always found baseball to be a helluva good way to make cash from a legitimate business. Being the manager of Mama Moretti's was a pain in the ass sometimes, but most of the time it was good work which he loved at the end of the day.

Plus it didn't hurt that the restaurant was one of several places throughout New York City which the Moretti Family used to help launder their money.

As his employees worked hard all around him, Ray flattened the dough on a table and then he spread some marinara sauce on it. After that he sprinkled on the cheese and he put on all sorts of delicious meats and vegetables, and after it was ready he got one of his chefs to send it to the oven. Ray was satisfied, and he decided to head back out to the register to see if he could help a bit over there. He gave one of the cashiers a much-deserved break and he went to run his register himself.

As he manned the register he noticed that a black car had stopped outside the restaurant. Ray saw two of his soldatos get out together and look at him through the window, but rather than go in through the front door Ray gave them the signal to head in through the back. The two soldatos nodded at him and then they walked around the side of the restaurant to head down the alley which'll lead to the back. He knew that they were going to report on what happened with a job he sent them to Yonkers for but it had to be discussed in private. Definitely not up at the front register.

Ray wondered how the two handled the thing in Yonkers but he had to forget about it for now since he saw a peculiar group of teenagers were heading into the restaurant from the sidewalk. _Customers._

A few of the teens appeared to be pretty average-looking and could for the most part blend in anywhere in New York. But then there was some girl with _pink_ hair, and then there was a boy who's blonde hair literally looked like a fucking cone! The fashion choices kids were using these days were getting a bit out of hand...

"-okay, so how about this place? I'd kill for a Caprese salad or something..." Ray heard an Asian-looking girl asked the group as they came inside.

"After that flight I'm willing to eat anything in sight, Yumi..." the pink-haired girl said as her stomach loudly growled.

"Better be careful saying things like that, Princess, or else we might christen you 'Odd 2.0'..." a boy next to the pink-haired girl joked.

"Wait, did _Ulrich_ just crack a joke? It must be the end of the world..." a blonde-haired boy with glasses joked back with amusement, causing the others in the group including the boy and the pink-haired girl to laugh.

Ray cleared his throat and he put on his best face as the teens approached the register. They all looked pretty tired and they also looked very,_ very_ hungry. They all also had some luggage with them and cone-hair also had a dog in a kennel, but since JFK International Airport wasn't too far away from the restaurant it didn't take the smartest minds of the world to guess that they had just came in from somewhere pretty far away: probably overseas. Foreigners popping into the restaurant every once in a while wasn't anything new to Ray, but as long as they had U.S. Dollars then he was more than welcoming towards them.

"Hello, welcome to Mama Morreti's. I'm the manager, Ray." Ray cheerfully greeted the teens as he gathered six menus for them. "If you'll follow me I can get you seated somewhere." he instructed.

The teens nodded and Ray walked out from behind the register with the menus in hand. Ray found an empty booth in the restaurant and the teens sat down in it, and then Ray set the menus down for them to look through. The teens had gone through an_ insanely_ long and boring flight from Paris and the food on the plane was nothing less than terrible, so before getting to their hotel they were anxious to try this place out and see if it was any good. Hell, they were all so hungry that any restaurant in New York City would've looked good to them at the moment...

But before Ray could take their drink orders, he saw one of his soldatos looking at him through the ticket window as if he was impatient to tell him something. With an annoyed sigh Ray decided to go and see what he needed.

"I'll get one of my servers with you in a second and he'll take your drink orders." Ray cheerfully told the group of teens at the table.

All of the teens were practically starving to death at this point, but out of politeness they didn't raise any objections as Ray walked away. As the teens patiently waited at their table Ray headed back to the kitchen and he went to two of his servers: one of whom he asked to man the register and the other to head to the table and take the teenagers drink and food orders. The waiters both nodded and they headed out as Ray walked over to his office, snapping his fingers at his two soldatos to get them to follow him in.

Moretti Family soldatos Vinnie 'Ice Pick' Galante and Derek Rosato closely followed their don into his office and Vincent shut the door behind them, locking it for some assurance of privacy. Both 'Ice Pick' and Derek went to sit in a pair of chairs in front of Ray's desk as Ray himself went to lean against the front of his desk, crossing his arms as he looked upon his two hopefully-successful men.

"How'd it go up there in Yonkers last night? Anything I'll need to worry about down the road?" Ray inquired to the soldatos.

"Job went through without a hitch, boss." Vinnie 'Ice Pick' replied with a proud grin.

"That warehouse lit up like it was a fuckin' tinderbox." Rosato added with a chuckle. "We had to rough up one or two guys who were watchin' the place but no one got whacked. That warehouse and all the cargo inside it is ash right now, and we made sure it'll be that way for months."

Ray was happy at the good news. That warehouse up in Yonkers was owned by a low-rate Irish mob gang led by Gerald Conway that the Family has had trouble with in recent months. Last October the Irish sparked their beef with the Italians by ganging up on a Moretti Family gunman who was doing a hit on a family traitor up in the Bronx's Pelham Bay. His crime? Merely wandering into Irish territory in the first place. There was no warning whatsoever for the gunman and Ray had only learned of the incident after the Irish left the poor bastard's severed finger outside his restaurant.

The Moretti guy himself was later thrown out of a moving car near Jefferson Avenue in broad daylight and in full view of hundreds of bystanders. He lived after that terrible beating from the Irish, but his recovery took several months and Ray personally paid out thousands of dollars in medical expenses to see his guy through it.

The Family retaliated to what happened to their guy by kidnapping and beating three of the Irishman to within an inch of their lives. From what Ray heard one of the fuckers suffered some serious and permanent brain damage, and another ended up paralyzed from the neck down for the rest of his life. He never found out exactly what happened to the third mick.

Since then there's been several small attacks from one side upon the other and there was legitimate worries that sooner or later a mob war was going to spark between the Conway Mob and the Moretti Family all over New York City. Conway's warehouse and the cargoes of illegal guns inside of it being burnt to cinders was just the latest act in a tit-for-tat showdown between the two groups.

In any event, Ray, beaming with pride in his men, went to pat the shoulders of both 'Ice Pick' and Rosato. They were pretty damn good at their jobs...

"You two did real good last night." Ray praised the two soldatos. "Conway's gonna be pretty damn mad once he hears about his warehouse being burnt, but he had it comin' and it was somethin' that needed to be handled. Thank you, boys." he added.

"Won't Conway come after the Family for this one?" Vinnie 'Ice Pick' wondered to his boss.

"Oh, I'm sure it's comin'." Ray replied with a shrug. "But those mick bastards started this whole thing knowing who they were up against. We'll handle whatever they try to throw at us, and if it comes to it we'll whack as many of them as we can and we'll burn everything they own across New York. I ain't worried, kid."

The two Moretti soldatos were eased by their don's lack of worry. However, they couldn't stay for much longer since their capo had asked them to head to some deli in Staten Island and rough up its owner a bit for missing out on protection payments to the Morettis. Ray was aware of this and he praised the two one more time before he told them to leave, and the two soldatos wished him a good day as they walked out of his office.

Ray organized a bit of paperwork on his deck before he decided to head back out into the restaurant. But once he got through the door to his office he heard some sort of a commotion coming from the dining area, so he ran through the kitchen to go and check what it was.

When he got to the dining area, Ray noticed that in the group of teens there was two who were in some sort of an argument with each other. They had gotten their food but the cone-haired boy had half of a breadstick shoved in his mouth, and the Asian-looking girl next to him looked _pissed_. Ray guessed that the kid probably stole a few breadsticks from her while she was eating from her bowl of Caprese salad with pesto sauce.

"Odd, baka! _(idiot!) _You've got your own food! Quit stealing!" the Asian-looking girl told him off with an annoyed tone.

The cone-haired boy appeared to say something back to the girl, but Ray couldn't hear very well what it was due to both distance the fact that the cone-haired kid's mouth was completely stuffed. But whatever he said caused the other teens with them to laugh while the Asian-looking girl grew more pissed off. Ray knew that she was probably about to strangle the guy, so he hurried over to try and diffuse the situation. The last thing he needed was customers fighting each other in his restaurant...

Ray approached the table just as the Asian teen was about to slap the back of the cone-haired boy's head. Once the teens saw Ray, however, they all turned their attention over to him. Ray simply smiled at the teens as they started calming down and he even leaned down to hand a few pieces of fresh sausage to the dog in the kennel, who was more than overjoyed to eat them.

"Relax a little bit, okay guys?" Ray smiled at the teens as he stood back up. "No need to start a fight in my restaurant. You'll get some extra drinks and a fresh pepperoni pizza during your meals today. All on the house." he added, deciding to be a bit of a good host to these foreign kids.

The teens were very surprised by the restaurant owner's kind offer. Thankfully the offer seemed to work since the Asian-looking girl was looking a lot more calm, while the cone-haired boy looked like he was going to drool due to simply hearing the words: "pepperoni" and "pizza" in the same sentence.

Ray glanced at the cone-haired boy's plate and saw it was empty. He was genuinely surprised that the cone-haired kid had eaten so much of his own food and his friend's food since he looked too scrawny to eat that much... or maybe he's svelte? He wasn't sure what the right word for the kid's appearance was. Anyway, the main thing was that the kids all looked pretty thankful towards Ray.

"Wow, thanks! That's really nice of you..." the tall black-haired boy said on behalf of the group.

"Anytime, kid. Happy to show a little hospitality every now and then." Ray said with a nod.

The other teens all gave their thanks to Ray as he walked away from their table. The teens went back to eating their meals as Ray headed to the kitchens and told a server in there to send out a pepperoni pizza and some new drinks over to the foreign kids, and then he headed back to his office. However, he stopped in his tracks when he saw the back door open.

Walking in was the Moretti associate Charlie Testa. He was a kid of around twenty-one years old and he first became associated with the Moretti Family sometime about four or five years ago. Ray had a lot of doubts about this kid at first but to his surprise the kid ended up holding his own amongst the more-experienced made men. He was annoying as fuck, sure, but the kid was pretty good at whatever Mike asked him to do for the Family.

Luckily, Mike didn't make the kid become an assassin for the Moretti Family or anything like that, but rather he usually limited him to running around New York City and New Jersey to do many of the random odd jobs that made men such as himself simply didn't want to do. But what was Charlie doing at the restaurant? Why'd he come to Ray of all people?

_This had better be good..._

"Hey, boss! I need to talk with ya about something..." Charlie asked his don for some time to hear him out.

"What?" Ray frowned. "Why the fuck are you bothering me, kid? You answer to _Mike,_ you don't go straight to the top. Hell, you could even call up Paulie, or Vinnie, or Henry and see if they can help y-"

To Ray's surprise, Charlie interrupted him. "Boss, please, this is something I _really_ need to speak to you about..."

Now, interrupting a mob boss as he was speaking was something of _massive_ disrespect, and Charlie should have known that by now given the time he's spent doing things around New York City for Mike and for the Family at large. But since he was absolutely not in the mood to give the kid a lecture or worse, Ray just sighed and allowed Charlie to continue. But rather than give him an explanation right then and there, Charlie simply gestured over to the back door and Ray could see Charlie's car was parked in the alleyway.

_What was this...?_

Reluctantly, Ray followed Charlie out the back door and over to the back of his car. Charlie looked around for any signs of people watching, and when he was absolutely sure that there was no one looking their way he pulled out his keys and he unlocked his car, opening one of the rear doors for his boss. Ray saw a blanket covering something in the back seats and he pulled it off, causing his eyes to slowly widen when he saw that in the car there was some guy laying unconscious, bloodied, and very, very bruised.

"..._._.._._.kid, what the fuck is this?!" Ray frowned, far more annoyed than anything else. "Who the fuck is this guy?! Where'd you get him?!" he demanded to know.

"He's one of Conway's boys! I snatched him off the street!" Charlie explained with a grin.

That revelation did it for Ray. Now he was pissed. The mafia don suddenly grabbed Charlie Testa by the scruff of his leather jacket, and before the kid knew what was even happening his don had already pushed him up against the brick wall of his restaurant. Don Moretti was so pissed at what he heard that he was struggling to not beat Charlie to a pulp right then and there.

"You grabbed one of Conway's boys without even tellin' anyone?! Tellin' _me_, even?!_ Have you actually lost your fuckin' mind, kid?!_" Ray again demanded an explanation from the young mobster.

Charlie appeared to be taken aback by his don's reaction. "What're you talking about?! We're warring against these bog-trotters, right?!"

"Do you not realize that snatching one of 'em off the street is gonna draw a shitload of heat on us?! Christ, it's _daylight_ out there right now, Charlie! There's _tens of thousands_ of people walking the streets in the Bronx alone!" Ray stated.

_"No one saw me!"_ Charlie defended himself. "The drunk motherfucker was emptying his lunch in an alley off of Lafayette! Had to kick the living shit out of him, but there totally wasn't anyone around who was watchin' us."

"Then why the fuck did you bring him_ here?!_ Why couldn't you take him to Paulie?... Fuck, why couldn't you take him to _anyone_ else?! My restaurant is a legitimate business for a reason, you stupido cazzo!_ (dumb fuck!)_"

"Mike isn't answering his phone and neither is Henry! Hell,_ everyone's_ either busy or not picking up! Even Paulie's busy with somethin' in Long Island too!"

Ray's fist trembled with rage but he let go of Charlie's coat and backed away, allowing the young mobster to get away from the wall. Ray couldn't believe that Charlie was dumb enough to bring one of the Irish goons directly to Mama Moretti's. He understood that usually the people who work for him were busy across New York City or even beyond, but if Charlie had just bothered to call Ray then maybe he could have offered a place or two for him to take the unconscious mick.

Whatever.

It is what it is.

Either way, the mick could maybe be useful to the Moretti Family after all. Maybe he knew something about Gerald Conway's operations in the Bronx, or maybe he could at least tell Ray something useful about the Conway Mob or the people who helped run it. So, with a sigh, Ray gestured to the unconscious mick and then he gestured over towards the back door of the restaurant. He'd have told the kid to take him to Paulie's scrapyard but if Paulie was busy then Ray didn't really have a choice but to hold the Irishman here until Paulie finished up with his business.

"Move him inside and put him in the freezer. Don't say a fuckin' word while you do it, kid. _Not. One. Word._" Ray ordered with a warning the kid wouldn't forget.

Charlie was so frightened by his boss's sudden warning that he stayed completely silent as he did what he was told. Luckily once you went inside the freezer was a ways away from the kitchen, so Ray didn't have to rush his workers out to prevent them from seeing anything. Ray opened up the back door for Charlie and he didn't dare lift a finger to help him. He was gonna do every bit of this himself: lifting, moving, setting in the freezer.

A struggling Charlie managed to get the guy through the door as Ray went to open the door to the freezer. After that, he simply walked away and left Charlie to deal with this until he could get back. For the kid's own sake he _better_ not fuck any of this up.

Ray took a deep breath and calmed himself down a bit as he headed back out to the restaurant. Even though there was an unconscious Irishman in his freezer he still had a business to run. He got back to the register and he continued to ring up customers as they came up. The foreign kids from earlier were still at their table and now they were sharing a pizza together, and Ray was close enough to hear them chatting with each other about their plans to drive down south to surprise some friends of theirs who were going to be in Atlanta in a week or so. Guess the kids have a _long_ trip ahead of them...

More and more people came into the restaurant with each passing minute and soon the bar in the other room was packed up with people who were watching the Yankees game today. The cooks in the back were busy, the waiters were busy, Ray was busy, everyone who worked in the damn restaurant was busy and the money was just piling in the registers.

For now, things were starting to look up again.

* * *

Henry and Mike continued to wander in their search for Sinner's Palace. The two mobsters were still completely lost and they were struggling to figure out where _they_ even were, let alone the sex club's location. North? South? East? West? Who knew which direction they were even going. But they had to get their shit together and find this place or else Ray was gonna lose his shit...

"Okay, you remember where we parked?" Mike asked his fellow underboss.

"Mike, I don't even remember what _street_ we parked on." Henry replied as he kept looking around.

Mike cursed under his breath as he and Henry kept walking through the streets of Jamaica. Street after street, block after block, building by fucking building. Honestly, how difficult was it to find one god damn building in New York? Anyway, the two mobsters were getting more annoyed and even more tired, so the pair decided to plop down on a bus bench for a bit to rest their muscles.

As the two rested they looked at their surroundings in an effort to pass a little bit of time before they'd resume their search. There was some people here and there on the sidewalks and there was also a bunch of cars in the streets going to wherever the fuck people usually go at 2:30 in the afternoon. The two noted the irony of a conservative mosque which was standing next to some sort of a gay bar fittingly called "Willie's", and the two soldatos shared a laugh when they saw some fat guy trip and fall as he exited an ice cream shop down the street.

The two ceased their laughter when they saw a smoking hot blonde walking in their direction down on their side of the street. Mid-twenties from the looks of it, double-D's, maybe Latina? Along with a helluva nice ass to boot. The woman noticed the two mobsters eye-goggling her from their bench and she couldn't help but give them a wink as she walked past them, and she didn't protest when the two watched her hips and her ass as she kept walking down the street.

"..._._..._._..she winked at _me,_ y'know." Mike pointed out to his friend with a grin.

Henry didn't reply but he knew deep down that Mike was flat out wrong. Anyway, the sexy girl had turned and went down a different street and alas she went out of their sight, but the two noticed something else that got their attention. At the end of the street they were on they saw a building with some neon signs. At first glance the two could've sworn that it was a nightclub or a bar or something, but that's when they saw it. _A sign._ A sign which said the name of the business in that building.

_Sinner's Palace_

The two mobsters literally began to laugh with glee at having finally found that fucking sex club. After hours of walking and confusion and dealing with crazy people and jackasses, they had finally found Sinner's Palace. Mike and Henry stood up from the bench and they resumed their walk, only this time it was back down that street and towards the sex club they had been searching for.

Within minutes the two were just a block down the street from Sinner's Palace. However, the two froze when they saw a woman and a man walk out into their path from behind an alleyway together. Neither Henry nor Mike recognized the guy, but the woman was none other than the exact same crazy prostitute whom they had encountered hours earlier on the corner of Guy R Brewster Boulevard and Liberty Avenue.

Oh shit.

_Not her._

Please, God, not _her._

As if on cue the crazy prostitute looked in their direction, and unfortunately for them she smirked as she immediately recognized the two greaseballs who seemingly rejected her offer earlier. The man looked pretty confused as the woman walked away from him and over to them, as she thought that they had finally come around to wanting to get some action from her.

"Hey, boys..." the crazy prostitute greeted with a sultry smirk. "You two finally change your mind for little 'ol me? Well, as I said before, my rates are ten bucks for handjobs, twenty bucks for oral, fifty for pussy, and a hundred for shoving it up my-"

"**_NO!_**" Henry quickly stopped her in mid-sentence exactly as he had hours earlier. "Christ, _what the fuck is wrong with you,_ lady?! _Honestly?!_ I've known some crazy bitches in my life but so far you're the craziest I've seen in weeks!"

"Same here! Good God, who_ raised_ you?!" Mike asked with a feeling of shock.

The crazy prostitute looked just as offended by their words as she was by the mobsters dual rejections hours earlier. But rather than start screaming out for everyone within a mile and a half to hear like she did the first time, she merely looked over at the man and she gestured over at the two mobsters who were in front of her. The two mobsters blinked with confusion as she pointed at them.

"Volpe, are you gonna handle these two limp-dicks or what?!" the crazy prostitute snapped at the man who the two mobsters guessed was her pimp.

"Baby, you've seriously gotta cut down on the coke. _Relax..._" the man sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose.

Mike and Henry's eyes widened even more once they heard what the crazy prostitute called the man. The man himself didn't notice the surprise on either of the Italian faces looking at him, as he was far too busy dealing with the crazy prostitute's shit for the millionth time just this week. As the two began to get in yet another heated argument, Mike and Henry glanced at each other with jaws ajar as if they couldn't believe their luck.

_Volpe..._

_That's Italian for 'Fox'..._

_This was the motherfucker they needed to find!_

The Fox barely got another word out before the two mobsters roughly grabbed him by the arms. The crazy prostitute was stunned and she almost screamed for help, but a flash of the revolver tucked away in Mike's waistband immediately shushed her up. Just to make sure she wouldn't say anything to anyone, Henry went and passed her a $100 dollar bill which she had no qualms of taking. The Fox was stunned by how the prostitute was just allowing him to be taken like this.

"What the fuck, babe?! You're not gonna get help?!" the Fox asked as he struggled in the mobster's grip.

"_Fuck that! _I'm getting a burrito!" the crazy prostitute smirked as she stuffed the hundred bucks in her pocket.

The crazy prostitute walked away before the Fox could say anything else. With the crazy prostitute pacified, Mike and Henry began to haul the Fox towards Sinner's Palace. They tried their hardest to look unsuspecting towards the other people on the sidewalk but the Fox kept trying to fight them off, so with a sigh Mike clandestinely pulled his revolver out from his waistband.

The Fox's eyes widened and he stopped his struggles after he felt something like cold steel be pressed against his back, right on his spine. It didn't take a genius to recognize that one of the mobsters was aiming a loaded handgun at him.

"_Shut up. Stop fighting us. Relax... or I'll put two bullets in your spine and leave you to bleed on the sidewalk._" Mike whispered a threat to the Fox's ear.

Now Mike wasn't actually going to shoot the guy since he remembered Ray's orders, but the threat worked and the Fox stopped all resistance. Satisfied, Mike put the revolver back in his waistband and both he and Henry resumed leading the captive sex club owner back towards his club. All they needed once they got inside Sinner's Palace was the Fox's office and a locked door.

They were sure that they'd have him convinced to sell in ten minutes or less...

* * *

Inside Sinner's Palace, Henry and Mike kept a rough but clandestine hold on the Fox's arms as they led him through his club. Getting in was far more easy than it normally could have been since the Fox waved the bouncer aside, and now they were just trying to get to the owner's office. However, they were getting a tiny bit distracted by the sights which surrounded them at that very moment.

Completely naked girls, caged girls hanging from the ceiling, girls wearing leather, girls grinding on dudes laps and on each other, laser lights, a huge bar, some _great_ music playing on the speakers throughout the building... It was every lonely bastard's dream. The two mobsters were stunned by Sinner's Palace and they both made mental notes to come back sometime and find some girls to 'unwind' with.

If Mike and Henry weren't on the job then they'd sure as hell join in on the fun right at that moment, but alas Family business always comes first before pleasure. By then the two mobsters had let the Fox go and allowed him to lead them towards his office, but even so they still followed close behind in case he tried to run off. This greasy pimp wasn't off the hook _that_ easy.

As he walked with Mike, Henry got distracted by the sight of a topless woman and another far-more-nude woman kissing each other on a guy's lap. His eyes were glued to the scene and he wasn't watching where he was going, so of course it was only a matter of time before he accidentally bumped right into some waitress and caused them both to fall straight to the ground. Henry heard the sound of glass being shattered and he knew he must've fucked up someone's drink order. Mike heard the commotion but he kept on walking with the Fox since he couldn't risk letting him have an opportunity to run.

Henry stood up and brushed himself off before he went to help the waitress up. As he helped her up, Henry got a good look at the waitress's face and he couldn't help but admire how good she looked.

"I'm so, _so_ sorry about that, sir..." the waitress apologized as she was helped up.

"Ain't your fault, beautiful, I was, uh... _watchin' stuff._.." Henry shrugged after they got back up on their feet.

The waitress blinked before she glanced in the direction Henry was looking at before they bumped into each other. She almost immediately saw what drew his eyes and she began to laugh out loud at the sight of the two girls. She certainly couldn't blame him for losing concentration like that...

"_'Watchin' stuff'_, huh?" the waitress laughed at the mobster's excuse.

"Can you honestly blame me?" Henry shrugged, laughing a little along with her. "Anyway, my name's Henry... What's your name?" he asked.

"Ashley..." the waitress introduced herself. Luckily for Henry, she thought he was pretty cute as well.

Henry smiled at Ashley before he looked in Mike's direction once more. He saw his friend was impatiently awaiting with his captive outside of his office, and to show how impatient he was Mike gestured to his watch as if he was telling Henry to hurry up with the girl. Henry nodded at Mike and he went back to trying to court Ashley. Both the mobster and the waitress hit it off nice, and by coincidence it just so happened that they were both single.

After a few more moments of talk the two decided to take a chance and exchange numbers so that they could set up a date sometime. Ashley and Henry smiled at each other before Ashley gathered her tray and the surviving drinks and went back to her job. Henry watched as she walked away and he couldn't help but feel pretty happy, but alas he still had a job to do and he had to focus on that at the moment.

The young mobster hurried back to Mike and the captive Fox, and when no one was looking the two men practically threw the Fox into his office and hurried in with him. No one noticed any of this and Henry locked the door behind them so that they wouldn't have anyone walk in on what they were about to do.

Shoving the Fox into his own office chair, Henry cracked his knuckles and prepared himself as Mike stood guard by the door. The Fox didn't even get a word out before Henry socked him hard in the face, causing the Fox to yelp and hold his now-bloody nose. Mike couldn't help but let out a laugh at what he was seeing.

_**"FUCK!**__**!**__**! YOU BROKE MY FUCKING NOSE!**__**!**__**!"**_ the Fox exclaimed before he let out a deep, very pained groan.

"Oh, I'm just getting started, motherfucker!" Henry growled, intending to let out some built-up steam upon this son of a bitch.

Henry roughly yanked up the Fox by his jacket and he pushed him against the walls of his office. The Fox tried to fight back but alas the punch he got in his face fucked him up bad, as everything around him was a bit blurred and he couldn't even stand straight due to dizziness. Henry wasted no time in taking advantage of the Fox's injuries and he pinned him against the wall, angrily pressing the club owner's head against it.

"Sinner's Palace is under Moretti control now, cagna! _(bitch!)_" Henry barked at the reluctant owner. "From now on you answer to Don Moretti! You pay him what you owe him and you _always_ pay him on time! If you don't, then _we'll_ come back and we'll_ make_ you pay!" he threatened.

_"What?! _B- But I can't agree to that! I need that cash!" the Fox pleaded with the mobsters.

Henry simply pulled the Fox away from the wall and pushed him straight into a glass display case full of stupid knick-knacks and photos of the business and himself. Mike's laughter only intensified as the Fox went headfirst into some glass shelves and doors, breaking every single bit of them. The Fox could only groan as he laid on the floor, his face and arms now cut up pretty bad.

As Mike's laughs finally died down for now, Henry stormed over to the Fox and he again yanked him up by his jacket. He walked the Fox over to his desk and pushed him down against it, roughly pinning his head on the oak. The Fox coughed up a little of the blood in his mouth onto his desk as Henry picked up a paperweight.

Flipping the Fox over, Henry raised the paperweight and he slammed it down onto the Fox's face. Then he did it again. And again. And again, and again, and again one more time just to be safe. Even Mike was a bit stunned at what he was seeing, although it was still funny to see this guy get his shit kicked in.

Dropping the now-bloody paperweight Henry allowed the Fox to slide down the side of his desk and collapse onto the hardwood floor. The Fox was allowed to gather his breath for a moment or two and to get his bearings again, and once he was sure the Fox could handle it Henry yanked him back up onto the desk. The Fox could barely stay conscious from the treatment he was getting from these mobsters... His nose was broken, he was sure at least one of his eyesockets was the same way, and his mouth was full of blood from several broken teeth.

Henry couldn't help but smirk. He had the Fox right where he wanted him...

_ "Now..."_ Henry began. _"Are you gonna sign the contract Mr. Campbell, or do I have to keep going?"_

* * *

About thirty minutes after Charlie lugged the Irishman into the freezer, Ray finally found time to get away from the register and the customers. The Moretti don headed back through the kitchens with a chair in his hands and a pair of pliers and some zip ties in his pocket. Charlie opened the door to the freezer for Ray since his hands were full, and after Ray went in he went to stand outside to make sure no one would walk in on Ray and the mick.

Ray glanced at the unconscious Irishman and shook his head with disgust. The guy smelled like liquor, vomit and shame... Anyway, Ray set the chair up in the far side of the freezer and then he went to get the mick in the chair. It wasn't too hard but Ray kept accidentally bumping into the slabs of meat and the crates of pizza ingredients and whatever else was stored in there.

The freezer was, obviously, fucking_ freezing_, but Ray didn't care too much about the cold. The only thing he cared about right now was that this guy might have some good info in that half-drunken brain of his. Ray lugged the Irishman into the chair and he set to work on tying his ankles and his wrists to the arms and legs of the chair. This was good since the guy began to wake up as Ray finished the last zip tie.

The Irishman's eyes opened and he looked around with a very blurred vision. The last thing he remembered was that he was emptying his lunch in some dirty alley somewhere in the Bronx... now he was cold? But it was summer... Christ, and his head was _killing him._

_"W- Wha...?"_ the Irishman groggily asked himself as he looked at his surroundings. "W- Where... _the fucker...?_ Where's that bitch I was in...?" he slurred.

"Whatever whore you're talking about ain't here, dipshit." Ray frowned as he stepped back from the chair, glaring down at his captive.

Outside the freezer, Charlie continued to keep guard against anyone who may try to get into the freezer. Luckily the freezer had some thick, steel walls, so there was no chance anyone outside was going to hear anything going on between Ray and the Irishman. A few bus boys and a chef went past Charlie at one point or another, but thankfully none of them needed to get into the freezer.

Inside the freezer, Ray was trying to give the Irishman a chance to squeal on Conway without having to hurt him. However, the Irishman was pissed off at having been snatched off the streets like a dog. However, his anger only intensified as he recognized his captor as being none other than Don Moretti himself. The fuck was Don Moretti kidnapping Irishmen for? The warehouse that got torched in Yonkers wasn't enough for these wop cocksuckers?!

"What's your name, kid?" Ray inquired as he pulled his pliers out of his pocket, examining it.

"Fuck you, Moretti." the Irishman growled defiantly. "You think you're gonna get away with doin' all of this? Burning Conway's warehouse? Snatchin' one of his boys off the streets? You're putting yourself in a lot of shit, same with your men..."

Ray chuckled as he set the pliers down on a shelf next to his captive. "If anyone's gonna be in a lot of shit then it's you in a couple of minutes, buddy..."

The Irishman struggled to get out of his zip ties as Ray went to look through the freezer for anything else which could be useful. Normally he didn't bother with messy business like this since it was Paulie's job, but alas sometimes you just have to do the dirty work yourself even if you're a mafia don. The Irishman tried to bite through the zip tie on his right wrist but unfortunately for him it didn't help at all.

Meanwhile, Ray kept up his search but unfortunately he didn't find much that could be useful in a situation such as this. There was a few things in his office but he simply didn't want to go through the effort of looking around for them. Therefore, Ray was just gonna have to rely on the pliers and his two fists to get this done...

The Conway goon stopped his struggles against the zip ties as Ray came back to him and picked up the pliers which he set on the shelf. Ray was sure he'd get the guy to crack, but in contrast the guy himself wasn't afraid of this dago motherfucker no matter if he was a don or not.

No matter how tough he thought he was, this Irishman had no idea what he was about to face.

* * *

After the mess at Sinner's Palace, Henry and Mike drove back to Mama Moretti's to let Ray know that the Fox agreed to sell a partnership of the business to the Moretti Family: allowing the sex club to become a part of the Family's prostitution ring. The two beamed with pride as Henry parked his car outside the restaurant. The Fox was left as a mess but he wasn't going to die, so it was basically a lot of harm but no foul for the mobsters.

"You notice that the motherfucker actually pissed his pants?" Mike chuckled about the Fox as he shut his door.

"You kiddin' me? You know he shit himself too, right?" Henry responded as he and his friend walked up to the front door.

The two Moretti underbosses shared a laugh as they headed into the restaurant together. The place was busy as fuck today and every table was taken, and the bar was so packed that it was almost like a clown car. Henry and Mike made their way past the waiters and waitresses and all of the tables of customers in an effort to get to Ray's office. But as they walked, Mike accidentally tripped on the leg of a chair and he landed right on his face.

Mike cursed in pain after he fell and he slowly started to get back up, but then he felt a hand on his arm trying to assist him onto his feet. Mike turned and went wide eyed when he saw that it was some pink-haired teenage girl who helping him up. _Pink_ hair? What the fuck? It certainly didn't look like it was dyed... Although thanks to the crazy prostitute this wasn't the weirdest thing he's seen all day...

"Are you okay, sir? That looked like a nasty fall..." the pink-haired girl said with concern.

The rest of the girl's friends watched from their table as she helped Mike back up to his feet. Mike himself continued to look bewildered about the girl's hair but he nodded at her question and he brushed himself off, allowing the girl to let go of his arm.

"Sir? Are you okay? Are you injured?" the pink-haired girl asked again.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine... Thanks for the help, kid." Mike said to the girl with appreciation.

The pink-haired girl nodded and turned to go back to her table, but Mike stopped her before she could. This girl was polite and that was a very nice change of pace from the people he usually dealt with throughout New York City, and luckily for her Mike was also a very generous man from time to time whenever he was in a good mood. The pink-haired girl and her friends watched as Mike reached into his pocket, and before any of them knew it Mike had pulled out a $100 dollar bill and he set it down in her hand, patting her shoulder.

"Don't spend it all in one place, kid." Mike chuckled before he walked away.

The pink-haired girl blinked with confusion as she looked at the hundred bucks in her hand and all of her friends looked just as stunned as she was. She helps a guy off the ground and he gives her $100 dollars for it? Something was definitely fishy about that guy...

In any event, the teens were pretty time-consumed and they couldn't stop to worry about the cash at the moment. They had to get to their hotel and check into their rooms within the next hour and a half, and knowing the traffic heading into Manhattan they were going to be cutting it pretty close. Either way they had a few days to kill as tourists in New York City before they'd head south to do the same thing in Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington D.C., and then they'd sight see all the way down the rest of the East Coast and to Atlanta so they could meet up with their friends.

As the teens paid for their meals and left to get to their hotel, Mike and Henry walked through the kitchen and they went to Ray's office. To their surprise he wasn't in there, but then they noticed that the young Charlie Testa was standing outside of the freezer as if he was a guard. What the hell was this...?

"Charlie?" Mike asked with surprise as he and Henry approached. "What the hell are you doing here? Didn't I tell you to go and handle that thing with the laundromat in Newark today?" he inquired.

"Yeah, I already dealt with that, but, uh... I kinda got into a situation." Charlie awkwardly replied to his boss.

Before Mike could ask what Charlie did this time, the freezer door opened. The two mobsters saw a chilled Ray was poking his head through the door as if he heard the talking outside, and he smiled when he saw it was his loyal underbosses.

"Hey, there you two are!" Ray smirked at his men. "How did all of that business over in Queens go? Did Campbell sign over the club to the Family?" he asked.

"It took a bit of _'convincing',_ but yeah, the Family owns Sinner's Palace now. Sam just has to go over there and sign the contract." Henry replied with a shrug.

"That's great. You guys did real good out there." Ray praised his guys before he looked over his shoulder, as if he noticed something.

Ray hurried back into the freezer and the sound of a scuffle could be heard. Charlie continued to wait outside as Mike and Henry rushed in to see what was happening, although they weren't really prepared to meet the sight of some tied-up guy who was half-frozen and half-beaten to death. The guy was zipped-tied to the chair and he was laying on the floor after the chair tipped during an attempt to escape. Ray, however, wasn't gonna let him off _that_ easy.

"Hey, where do you think you're going, buddy? Is my hospitality not enough for you?" Ray joked to his captive as he righted the chair.

Henry and Mike got a good look at the poor bastard. They did some bad shit to the Fox earlier, but that looked like nothing compared to what Ray seemed to have done to this guy. The captive had several teeth ripped out by the bloody pliers in Ray's hand and the guy's face was beaten worse than how the Fox's was. One of his kneecaps was definitely shattered and one of his eyes was beaten so badly that it looked like mush now. There was no way he could see out of that eye ever again...

_"F- Fuckin' psycho!__!__! I didn't do anything to you!__!__!"_ the captive groaned, half-panicked and terrified by the mafia don's treatment of him.

"Nah, you didn't... but your boss did." Ray retorted with a grin.

Ray laughed a little bit as he watched the captive try once again to get out of his zip ties. This try ended in failure just like the last 20 or 30 times, but it never got old for the mafia don who was torturing him. Ray turned to look at his two confused and unnerved underbosses, and as he looked at them he ceased his laughter and gestured back over to the guy tied up in the chair.

"Boys, meet my new buddy Daniel Pearse." Ray introduced the captive Irishman. "Daniel here was kind enough to let me know that he's a high-ranking made man in the Conway Mob. He's met our _mutual friend_ Gerald Conway before." he added.

"What's he doing in here, boss?" Henry inquired.

"Charlie swiped him from the Bronx. Didn't bother to ask for permission or anything, but since we've got the guy now there's not really much else we can do but see if he's got some juicy stuff to tell us." Ray shrugged.

Mike went wide eyed at this revelation but then it settled into a deep frown as he looked back at the door. Charlie really fucked up this time... But, if Ray wanted to see if this Irishman knew anything important, then maybe the mick still had some sort of a use for the Moretti Family. Who knows? Maybe the mick knew something that could be useful about the Conway Mob.

Ray, meanwhile, had turned his full attention back to his captive. The Irishman was absolutely terrified at this point and the pain was close to unbearable. But even so, Ray still had a thing or two to ask Pearse.

"Alright, Pearse..." Ray began as he slowly turned the bloody pair of pliers in his hand. "You have any idea where Gerald Conway's gonna be in the next few days? Or how about his rackets? Are any of 'em weak enough to be taken? Fuck, do you know _anything_ that can be useful for us?" he inquired.

"I- I already told you what I know, dude! I swear that I don't know anything about his rackets or anything like that!" Pearse coughed up a little blood as he spoke.

The Moretti don simply nodded in silence at what Pearse said, although he didn't believe a single word of it. He knew Pearse still had something still locked away in that head of his and he was damn sure gonna find out what it was... Pearse's eyes widened as he watched Ray bring the bloody pliers back down to his restrained left hand, and before Pearse could say anything Ray had already used it to break the ring finger on his left hand. He felt nothing short of agony from his finger being bent completely backwards at the joint.

_**"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!**__**!**__**!"**_ Pearse screamed as loud as he could from the pain.

_**"YOU WANT ME TO KEEP GOING?! YOU GOT NINE MORE!**__**!**__**!"**_ Ray warned the captive as he readied the pliers on another finger.

Henry and Mike watched the scene with interest as Pearse whimpered and sobbed. His hand was on fire. His ruined eyeball and eyesocket was in agony. Most of his body was in terrible pain and he definitely couldn't take any more of Ray's treatment... and he knew it. He hoped that Mr. Conway and everyone else in his crew would be able to forgive him for what he was about to say...

"N- No! I- I'll talk..._ I'll talk..."_ Pearse choked out.

Ray hesitantly pulled the bloody pliers away from Pearse's hand and he gave the Irishman a chance to say whatever he was going to say about the Conway Mob. Pearse had to take another moment or two to find the strength to even speak, but Henry, Mike and Ray were patient enough to let him collect himself. Who could blame him? He's been through some serious shit today...

"O- Okay..." Pearse finally began to say. "M- Mr. Conway's been having some... some _financial troubles_, lately... B-Bad ones, from what I've heard... and he's planning somethin' big to make it all up..." he explained.

The three mobsters were intrigued with what they were hearing. Conway's planning something big soon? What was it?

"H- H... He's doin' a robbery... A _huge_ one. H- He said there'll be enough to go around for everybody..." Pearse explained, albeit fearfully.

"A robbery? What's the take?" Ray asked with a sudden frown.

Pearse went silent again and he became reluctant to keep talking. This was bad news for him since Ray's patience was starting to run out. Henry and Mike both cringed as Ray readied his bloody pliers and moved them to the middle finger on Pearse's left hand. Before Pearse could say anything, Ray had already jerked the captive's middle finger back and broke it just like how he did his ring finger. Again, Pearse felt nothing short of excruciating pain.

_**"AAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHFUCKFUCKFUCKFUCKOKAY!**__**!**__**! OKAY!**__**!**__**! JESUS, STOP!**__**!**__**!"**_ Pearse screamed out. "_A- Armoured cars full of cash!__!__!_ That's what Mr. Conway's plannin' to take! They're comin' outta the West Point mint and they're full of old bills that're supposed to get sent to Fort-Worth so they'd be replaced and destroyed!" he explained.

"Old bills, huh? That sounds like it could be a good take for Conway..." Ray muttered under his breath before he decided to ask his next question. "When's the robbery gonna take place? Where, even? How many guys is he sending after those armored cars?"

"I- I don't know!" Pearse exclaimed, dreading at whatever might happen next.

Ray didn't even bother with hearing whatever Pearse's next bullshit excuse was, so again he readied his pliers. Ray pressed them against Pearse's index finger on his left hand and he bent it back just like he did to Pearse's ring and middle fingers: breaking it with a crack that was just as loud and audible as the last two were. And, of course, it was also just as painful as those two were.

_**"AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHIDON'TKNOW!**__**!**__**!IDON'TFUCKIN'KNOW!**__**!**__**!I-ISWEARIT!**__**!**__**!**__**ISWEARIT!**__**!**__**!"**_ Pearse screamed in agony at having a third finger be broke.

The Moretti don was almost ready to break the last two finger's on Pearse's left hand, but he relented as he slowly started to realize that Pearse was probably telling the truth. It made sense that Conway probably wouldn't have told him the finer details of his heist plan... With a sigh, Ray set his bloody pliers on the shelf again and he finally ended the interrogation. Pearse had told him everything he needed to know...

Panting from sheer exhaustion, the tortured Pearse glanced down at his tied-up left hand and he shuddered at the sight of three of his fingers bent all the way backwards. He was close to tears and he just wanted to go home... He wanted to go _home_, he wanted to go to his _kids_... He didn't want to have anything to do with Gerald Conway or Ray Moretti anymore.

_"L- Look..."_ Pearse began to say. "Look, y-you heard everything you wanted to know, right...? Ain't ya gonna let me go now...? I- I told ya everything I could, Ray..." he practically begged for his life.

Ray, Mike and Henry all glanced at each other as if they each asked what the other two wished to do. But after another moment Mike and Henry glanced at Ray and decided to let him choose Pearse's fate. It didn't take long for Ray to decide, so with a smile he went to pat Pearse on his shoulder.

"Of course, pal..." Ray lied to the Irishman's face. "Just give me a minute to untie ya and we'll let you go home."

Pearse felt extraordinarily relieved to hear this. Ray gave a warm smile to his captive and he patted his very-sore shoulder before he went behind the chair, clandestinely reaching behind his back for something. Before Henry or Mike knew it, Ray had already pulled a snub-nosed revolved from his waistband and he started to Pearse as hard as he could on the back of the head. He did this over and over again just to make sure Pearse would die...

Ray only stopped hitting the captive after the butt of his gun was covered in his blood. Hell, Ray had hit him so hard and so fast that he was even out of breath a little bit, but at least now the Irishman wouldn't be a problem. He certainly wasn't gonna breath a word about this to Gerald Conway... or anyone else for that matter.

_"Fuckin' bog-trotting cocksucker..."_ Ray muttered an insult at the dead captive as he set his bloody gun on the shelf next to the pliers.

"You think he was actually tellin' the truth about that plan of Conway's? The armored cars leaving West Point?" Mike inquired.

Ray shrugged as he used a rag to wipe the blood off his hands. "Honestly? I've got no clue. Hell, I don't even know if we'll actually do anything with this info, but I'll definitely have some guys look into it at least. There's probably gonna be some time before this heist of theirs happens and that'll give us an opportunity to find out the details. I'll handle it, guys, don't worry..."

Mike and Henry nodded as their boss went to knock on the freezer door. Within seconds it was opened and Charlie hurried inside to see if he had to help with the interrogation, but to his disappointment he saw that it was already over. Ray, however, actually did have something that Charlie could help with. It was doing every last fucking bit of the body disposal which now needed to be done.

"Deal with this mick." Ray instructed with a frown as he pointed at the corpse. "I'm not helping you. Mike isn't helping you. Henry isn't helping you. This is your mess and you're not gonna come back here until the mick is long gone... _got it?"_

Nervous due to his boss's attitude, Charlie merely nodded and he hurried over to the body so he could do away with the zip ties. Ray didn't bother to stay as he still had to deal with customers in the restaurant today, so he put on his best face and went back out to the register. Meanwhile, Henry and Mike stayed behind solely because they wanted to watch how Charlie could get the body out of the freezer, down the hall, and out into the trunk of his car.

It was gonna be a lot of effort. Hell, Charlie took several minutes just to get the zip ties off of the corpse, and this was even with a pocket knife which he had with him. Mike and Henry were trying their hardest not to laugh as Charlie awkwardly dragged the body out of the chair and over to the doorframe, where one of its pant legs accidentally got snagged on the corner of the door. Charlie groaned at this but it only took him a couple of seconds to get the leg unstuck.

The minutes rolled by and Charlie was already feeling tired by the time he got the corpse halfway down the hallway. The two underbosses looked upon Charlie as a complete amateur when it comes to body disposal...

The two mobsters reluctantly went to go and help Charlie take the body back out to his car. If they watched any longer then they'd have probably just laughed at the kid. Anyway, it was much easier now that three men were moving the corpse and with Mike and Henry grabbing Pearse's arms and legs Charlie didn't have to drag the mick on the floor. There was a little bit of blood on the ground from how Charlie dragged him, but it wasn't anything a mop couldn't handle.

Mike opened the back door to the alleyway and the three men carefully walked down a few steps with the corpse. Mike almost tripped on the last step but luckily he regained his footing. If they dropped the body _now_ then it wouldn't end well for any of them...

The three made it to the trunk of Charlie's car and the young mobster popped open the trunk for them. Alas, that's when Charlie realized that before he kidnapped Pearse he had picked up several suits from a tailor in Midtown Manhattan._ Very_ expensive suits... Hell, they were so pricey that they were the exact reason why he tossed Pearse in the backseat instead of the trunk in the first place.

The other two mobsters picked up on Charlie's reluctance to ruin his expensive suits with an Irish guy's blood, but alas for him they were on the clock and after the shit with Sinner's Palace they just wanted to head home. So before Charlie could move the suits to the passenger seat, the body was tossed into the trunk by Henry and Mike. Charlie was going to protest but the glares he got from the two mobsters shushed him immediately.

_"Sucks about your suits..."_ Henry said with an unsympathetic tone.

Charlie knew better than to respond to what Henry said, but it was still a real bummer that the suits were ruined. They practically cost a fortune and he never even got the chance to wear any of 'em...

Mike shut the trunk of the car and he looked at the young mobster. "Alright, so your best bet is that you're probably gonna want to take the mick over to Paulie's place. He'll probably know what to do with him... you know where it is?" he inquired.

"Yeah, I think I remember... Staten Island, right?" Charlie asked just to be sure.

"Yep, over on Richmond Terrace." Mike replied with a nod.

Charlie nodded and he readied to head out to Staten Island. With luck, Paulie was there and already finished with the stuff he had to do in Long Island today. The exhausted Mike and Henry bade Charlie goodbye and they headed out of the alleyway together so they could get back to Henry's car and head home. Charlie pulled out of the alleyway seconds later, and with that he set out for Staten Island...

* * *

Charlie drove his car and his recently-deceased captive away from Ray's restaurant like his don asked him to do. Having left Brooklyn and went down Interstate 278 into Staten Island, Charlie was on his way to the scrapyard owned by Moretti capo Paulie Marcano. Charlie wasn't really sure what to do with the corpse of Pearse and Marcano was really the only thing that was coming to mind on body disposal, so hopefully he was at his scrapyard today.

The young Moretti associate drove through Staten Island until he reached Mariner's Harbor. Once there he drove down Richmond Terrace until he got to Paulie's scrapyard, a small place but still a good asset for the Family. He saw that the gates to the scrapyard were open so he drove straight in, and he carefully made his way past the rows of old cars and stacks of crushed cars until he got to a clearing with a huge car compactor and a few buildings.

Paulie Marcano rubbed some oil off his hands with a rag as he stepped out of his garage for some fresh air, having worked on the engine of a Subaru from 1990-something. However, he saw the familiar car of young Charlie Testa approach, so he waved the kid over to a nearby spot where he could park. Charlie did so, and Paulie tossed the dirty oil-stained rag onto a toolbox before he went to see what the kid came here for.

Charlie got out of the car and he hurriedly walked over to meet with Paulie. The Moretti capo was in the middle of repairing a car and he was anxious to get back to it, so hopefully whatever Charlie needed could be quick.

"What're you doing here, kid? Mike send you?" Paulie inquired to the young mobster.

"Nah, the boss did." Charlie replied with a nod. "I- uh... I've got a problem that he told me you could probably help with..." he awkwardly added to the capo.

Ray sent the kid to his scrapyard? If it was Ray who needed something then whatever it was was far more important than a car engine. Paulie wanted to know more but Charlie simply gestured back over to his car. Paulie guessed almost immediately what was going on... Without saying a word Paulie walked over to Charlie's car and went straight to the trunk. Charlie unlocked it for him and the capo opened it.

Inside was the bloody and bruised Irish corpse.

Paulie silently stared at the corpse for what seemed like minutes before he slowly shut the trunk. He stared at the trunk for another moment or two before he turned to look at Charlie again, only this time with a blank expression on his face.

"You do all of this or did the boss?" Paulie inquired out of curiosity.

"The boss." Charlie replied with a shrug. "I'm the one who snatched the mick from the Bronx, though. He made my trunk smell like liquor, puke and piss, but-"

That's when the two suddenly heard the sound of banging metal coming from inside of Charlie's car. Both Charlie and Paulie looked directly at the trunk of the car and they immediately guessed what the problem was: the mick inside wasn't dead. He was hurt bad, but he definitely didn't sound like he was dead. The banging only grew louder and louder as the two men cautiously approached the car.

"You hear that...?" Charlie quietly asked the capo.

"No fucking shit I hear it, kid..." Paulie frowned in a normal tone of voice.

The banging kept on going and both Charlie and Paulie weren't really sure what to do at first. Getting rid of a corpse was one thing, but if this guy was alive then there was a chance he could be strong enough to fight them. For all they knew he could've found something in the trunk to use as a weapon, and the second they open it up they could get their throat slashed open by something sharp or get their skull caved in by something solid.

"What do we do, Paulie...?" Charlie cautiously asked as they stopped in front of the trunk.

"Take the car and bring it 'round back behind my shop. I've got an idea..." Paulie instructed.

Charlie nodded and he went to get back in his car as Paulie headed back into his garage. It didn't take long for Charlie to drive the car to the rear side of the building and from there he backed up the car so that the trunk would face the back door of the building. Paulie came out of the back door just a few seconds after Charlie shut off the engine, and the young mafioso got out of the car and hurried over to the trunk to stand with the capo.

Paulie was holding two things in his hands. In his left hand he held a solid-looking pipe wrench, and in his right hand he was holding a 9 millimeter Beretta pistol which had a silencer on the barrel. It didn't take the brightest mind to guess what Paulie intended to do about Pearse.

Cautiously, Charlie went back to the driver's seat and he reached into the car, setting his finger on the button which would pop open the trunk. He locked eyes with Paulie through the back window and he awaited his word to open up the trunk. After a few moments Paulie gave Charlie a nod, and then Charlie pressed the button and opened up the trunk.

Almost immediately Pearse tried to climb out the back of the trunk, but he only got halfway out before Paulie hit him right on the top of the skull with the pipe wrench. Now that he was stunned he was easy prey, so Paulie pulled him the rest of the way out of the trunk and then he hit him directly in the face with the wrench one more time. After he was sure Pearse was stopped, he pressed the tip of the silencer against Pearse's skull and he pulled the trigger three times: blowing the Irishman's brains onto the asphalt below them.

Daniel Pearse was no more...

"It is what it is, motherfucker..." Paulie muttered an insult at the dead Irishman.

_"Fuck, Paulie..."_ Charlie gawked at the mess which was made.

Paulie chuckled at the kid's reaction as he set the pipe wrench and the pistol on top of an oil drum next to the back door. He briefly wondered how he was going to deal with disposing Pearse's corpse, but then he remembered he had a good tool for the job. So, Paulie went over to Pearse and he grabbed the dead Irishman by the legs, and he strained a bit as he started to drag him away to a nearby shed.

"What're you doing with him?" Charlie inquired out of curiosity.

The capo simply pointed out to the waters of Newark Bay, which could easily be seen since it bordered with the back of his scrapyard. Charlie was confused and at first he thought that Paulie intended to simply throw the mick in the water, but Paulie sighed and he gestured back over to the shed again. Charlie could see that a part of it was being held above the water by a series of stilts.

"I'm gonna throw the mick in a chum maker I've got..." Paulie explained to the young mobster. "Trust me, the machine I've got'll carve him up real nice..." he added.

"Goddamn that's fuckin' messed up..." Charlie shuddered at the thought of the chum maker being used on a human corpse.

Paulie simply laughed at Charlie's reaction. "Fish gotta eat just like everyone else, kid!" he laughed.

Now feeling extremely queasy from the thought of Pearse in a chum maker, Charlie simply went back to his car without another word. He certainly wasn't gonna stay to watch what'll happen in the chum shed in the next few minutes... Even so, he had to admit that this was a helluva way to dispose of a corpse, even if it was not what he thought was gonna happen._ At all._

Paulie opened the door to the shed with his foot and dragged Pearse towards the chum maker as Charlie drove away, deciding to head back home so he could try to forget everything that happened today. However, the Moretti capo's messy work had only just begun...

Needless to say: Charlie wasn't going to be eating a fish for a _very_ long time...


	3. Money Troubles

**(I DO NOT own The Walking Dead, Code Lyoko, or any names/brands that might appear in the story. Any references to any person living or dead is merely a coincidence, and should NOT be taken as intentional.)**

* * *

A few days after the Irishman was killed by Paulie and Charlie, Henry had finally gotten together with that waitress Ashley Meyer and the two were out in Manhattan on their first date. So far, things were going very well and the two were enjoying each other's company, and after getting together for drinks the two were on their way to go and see a movie together.

The two had gotten a few drinks at a bar on West 45th Street and now they were walking through Times Square to get to a movie theater that Henry had ordered two tickets from off his phone. It was a real treat for both of them since neither Henry or Ashley usually ever head out to Times Square, let alone this part of Manhattan Island in general. It was raining as the two walked but Henry had an umbrella with him and the two were huddled under it together.

As the two walked through Times Square and onto West 42nd Street, Ashley stayed close to Henry while they looked around for the theater they were going to. She didn't remember the name of the theater exactly but she knew that it was one of those really awesome ones with the reclinable chairs. Anyway, she convinced Henry to watch some romantic comedy with her since she heard some good things about it from some friends of hers. Henry wasn't a fan of romantic comedies at all, but since it was his first date with Ashley he decided to just roll with it and to try to enjoy the movie if he could.

Ashley looked at her new boyfriend as they walked down the sidewalk together, the rain pouring all around them as they stayed under the umbrella. "Thanks again for taking me out, Henry. I'm having a great time so far." she smiled at him.

"Ain't a problem, Ash. I'm having a good time too." Henry smiled back at her.

The waitress beamed as she and her new boyfriend continued walking. As they walked down West 42nd and through the countless people on the street, Henry's cell phone rang. With an annoyed look in his eye he pulled it out of his pocket and the caller I.D. said it was Mike calling him. Henry _really_ didn't want to take a phone call in the middle of a first date, but he knew that any phone call from Mike could easily be an important one in regards to the Family.

So, Henry apologized to Ashley before he took his phone out of his pocket and answered it. "Yo, Mike? What's up, man?" he asked.

_"How's the date going? You get in that girl's pants yet or nah?"_

The mobster took a deep, very annoyed breath as he took in the words of his annoying friend. What Mike had said was loud enough for Ashley to hear from where she was walking, but rather than get offended she simply bit her lip and tried not to laugh at the very obvious attempt to egg Henry on. It was definitely working judging from the sheer amount of annoyance that was radiating off of Henry.

"No, Mike, not yet, and definitely _not_ on the first date." Henry frowned as he spoke.

_"Seriously, dude, you don't need to be a gentleman about it! Just whip out your cock and show her what she's missing out on!"_

Nope.

Henry was _not_ dealing with this today.

With a sigh, Henry simply hung up the phone without even answering to his friend's statement. Ashley broke out laughing almost immediately after she saw the look of sheer annoyance on her new boyfriend's face. She thought it was cute in its own sort of way...

Eventually the new couple made it to the theater they were looking for and they headed straight to it, finding a pretty long line of New Yorkers already waiting to get their movie tickets. Ashley groaned a bit under her breath since she thought that they'd now have to wait in line for a while to get to the counter, but to her surprise Henry simply walked up to the ticket booth as if the line was invisible to him.

Ashley lagged behind a bit as she followed, but she could see that Henry was talking with the guy behind the booth. She had no idea what Henry said to him since she was too far to hear it, but after Henry stopped speaking the guy behind the ticket booth didn't hesitate to hand Henry two tickets for the romantic comedy that Ashley wished to see. Even more surprising to her was that Henry didn't even pay the guy!

The bartender was completely stunned by what she had seen.

Just who on earth _was_ Henry De Luca?

Henry noticed that his new girlfriend was still standing on the sidewalk. He smiled at her as he gestured over at the front doors of the theater. "Ash? You comin'? The movie'll start soon and I wanna get some popcorn and somethin' to drink first..."

Ashley had a newfound feeling of hesitance from what she had just seen, but she relented and she followed Henry to the front doors of the theater. However, the feeling of hesitance didn't leave Ashley as they headed inside. Something suddenly felt off to her. Not good, not bad, just... _off._

Henry shook some of the rainwater off of his umbrella and then the new couple then headed up to the concession stand and ordered themselves a tub of popcorn and some drinks. Henry got himself a medium cherry Coca-Cola and Ashley got herself a raspberry slushie. Of course they also added an incredibly unhealthy amount of butter and salt to their popcorn, and then they went to find the auditorium room where their movie was playing.

They found their auditorium room after a couple of moments of searching and they headed inside to find their seats. The previews were still playing on the screen as they made their way down their isle and got to their seats. When they sat down, Ashley noticed that the cupholder on her seat was broken. But Henry was kind enough to offer to switch seats with her so that she'd have somewhere to rest her drink. She rewarded him with a kiss on the cheek for that.

As she sat down in her new seat, Ashley turned to look at her new boyfriend. She was still bugged by whatever happened outside by the ticket booth. "Hey, what was that back there?" she inquired to him.

"Huh? What do you mean?" Henry blinked at her question as he sat down in the other seat.

Ashley deadpanned. "Out there by the ticket booth. There was a huge line of people and you got us to bypass all of it... I saw that you said something to the ticket guy but I couldn't hear what you said to him." she stated.

The previews on the screen soon ended and the lights inside the auditorium room dimmed as the opening credits for the movie began. Henry leaned himself a little bit closer to Ashley so that he could be quieter and not bother the other moviegoers as he answered her.

"I, uh..." Henry trailed off as he tried to think of a good excuse. Luckily for him he found one in just a few moments. "...I work in construction, Ash. I'm a Union delegate out in Queens. Job's a bit demanding, but it's more than worth it."

"A Union delegate?"

The mobster shrugged and he continued with his lie. "Yeah, for the last six or seven years now. It pays pretty well and it's made me a few friends in the city, especially down in city hall. Again, the job's a bit demanding, but it's more than worth it..."

Ashley nodded in reply to her new boyfriend but she didn't say anything else on the matter, and it wasn't long before she looked back up at the screen to watch the movie. Henry felt relief that she didn't pry any further, as he didn't want to tell Ashley his true way of life. He really started to like this girl, and he felt that their relationship had so much potential to grow. But Henry knew that if he just up and told Ashley that he was a high-ranking mobster of the Moretti Crime Family then she'd probably leave and never speak to him again...

Ashley herself still felt somewhat uneasy about what had happened out there at the ticket booth. To be honest, Ashley really had no clue what a Union delegate was or what a Union delegate does to be able to do stuff like get ahead of long lines at the movie theater. She's had more than a few boyfriends over the years but she's _never_ had any that did something like that for her. Most of them turned out to either just be assholes or gay.

However, Ashley decided to just put all of this in the back of her mind for now and to just enjoy their first date regardless of the strange thing that had happened outside The waitress decided to put some trust in her new boyfriend's explanation and to not pry any further for now. They were on their very first date together and now was the time to enjoy each other's company. Hopefully this new relationship will work out...

* * *

Vinnie 'Ice Pick' Galante and Derek Rosato were running as fast as they could.

The two Moretti soldatos were on the job in Brooklyn. Paulie had sent the two men out a few hours ago to collect on a huge debt from a neighborhood drug-pusher named Jerome Chedjou, a man who more often than not went by his streetname "Mamba." This man usually sold his products over near the Grand Army Plaza on Flatbush Avenue and he was doing reasonably well for himself thanks to the city's tweakers, but last month Mamba had taken out an expensive $12,000 dollar loan from Paulie in order to start up some stupid new business venture.

Paulie didn't remember too well what Mamba said his venture was or what he wanted to do for it, but he thought that it had something to do with buying up knockoff Gucci purses by the bulk and selling them for a profit across the Five Boroughs. That, or something about buying up all sorts of expensive equipment to start up two or three new crystal labs somewhere out in Long Island or Long Beach or Long Branch or something... somewhere that started with "Long", that was for sure. Being the successful loan shark that he was, Paulie sometimes got the stories of his customers confused with each other.

Whatever. It didn't matter what the guy wanted the cash for. What matted most was that Mamba didn't pay back his debt and that now he was also completely ignoring all of Paulie's phone calls. Paulie had exhausted every last peaceful means at his disposal to try and get the $12,000 dollars that this scumbag has owed him, but unfortunately it was now the time to send in the big guns to make Mamba pay one way or another.

If Mamba didn't have the money for Paulie, then he'd be dealt with by the big guns: Derek and Vinnie 'Ice Pick'. It is what it is.

However, the very second that this prick Mamba saw the_ literal_ big guns which Vinnie 'Ice Pick' and Derek aimed at his face, he bolted down the street. Now the two soldatos were struggling just trying to catch up to him. This wasn't the first time they had to reclaim a debt, but usually they were intimidating enough to scare any debtors stiff. They must've been getting rusty...

Mamba was surprisingly fast and he seemed able to avoid everything he was running into, whether it be people or cars and all sorts of other obstacles Vinnie 'Ice Pick' and Derek weren't that lucky, and it wasn't long before they resorted to simply pushing and shoving people out of the way as they ran. They were both being as careful as they could to avoid pushing away children or old people, but everyone else was fair game in their footchase.

After he noticed that Derek and Vinnie 'Ice Pick' were starting to catch up to him, Mamba desperately bolted off the street and down into an alleyway to try and lose the mafioso. But Vinnie 'Ice Pick' and Derek were good at their jobs. This guy would need God on his side if he had any hope of escaping them.

_"Bac' off, niggas!"_ Mamba shouted back at the two men as they chased after him. "Go bac' to Staten n'tell dat fat fuc' Paulie dat him ain' gettin' shit fro' me! Yo' jus wastin' yo time now, greaseballs!" he further taunted the pair.

Vinnie 'Ice Pick' and Derek were getting pretty annoyed by this guy. They had to find a way to end this stupid chase one way or another.

As the two mobsters kept chasing after Mamba, Derek could see that the alleyway was about to take a hard right and head out towards another street. But they both could see an entrance to a side-alley that they'd reach before they'd reach that turn. If they were lucky, one of them could head down the side-alleyway and cut this bastard off before he could escape them.

"Vinnie! Cut this sonuvabitch off!" Derek said to his friend as they saw Mamba was gaining some distance from them again.

Vinnie 'Ice Pick' noticed the side-alley and he immediately ran down it. Meanwhile, Derek kept running as quickly as he could as Mamba turned right and ran for the street, hoping to steal a car or find somewhere he could finally lose these guys. Derek could see that there was another side-alley entrance on this side of the alleyway. Hopefully Vinnie would rush through any second now...

Just as it seemed like Mamba would escape, Vinnie 'Ice Pick' burst through the side-alley entrance and he hit Mamba's leg as hard as he could with an old lead pipe he found. Of course, Mamba screamed in agonizing pain as he tumbled down onto the ground. The broken kneecap he suffered made sure that he wouldn't run from them again.

As Mamba's screams finally died down to pained groans, Derek finally made it to the scene. The mobster was completely breathless from all of the running and he had to take a moment to collect himself again. "Y- You... You fuckin' made me _run_, you fast asshole... _Fuckin' hell..._" he said in-between gasps for air.

"Jesus, dude, you need to go on a diet..." Vinnie 'Ice Pick' said with a roll of his eyes to his friend as he held onto the lead pipe. He wasn't out of breath in the slightest.

Derek eventually caught his breath again, although he did make a mental note to consider going on a diet as Vinnie suggested. He wasn't at Paulie's level of obesity, but Christ if he was actually out of breath from that footchase then he needed to start working out some more...

After wiping some sweat off of his brow, Derek approached the now-crippled drug dealer and he stared him down for a moment. Then Derek stomped down hard on Mamba's broken kneecap out of vengeance for running from him and Vinnie - causing the dealer to scream again. It felt good to make the bastard pay, but Derek only kept this up for a few seconds before he finally pulled his foot off of Mamba's knee. He needed the guy alive and conscious, and he definitely needed him to be unhurt enough to focus on telling them where Paulie's money is.

"Good to finally speak with you, Mr. Chedjou." Derek sarcastically said down at the crippled drug dealer as he pulled his foot away. "Now that we've got all of this needless runnin' out of the way, I'm gonna cut to the chase: _where the fuck is Mr. Marcano's money, huh?_ You owe him twelve grand, buddy, now where is it?"

The pain finally began to recede a little from Mamba's kneecap but it still hurt him pretty badly if he tried to move it. Mamba gritted his teeth as he scooted backwards so that he could prop his back up against a brick wall. Vinnie 'Ice Pick' and Derek kept a watchful eye on him in case he tried to do anything rash, and whether Mamba liked it or not he absolutely wasn't in any condition to run away again.

Mamba tried to ignore the pain in his leg as he looked up at the two mobsters. "L- Look, guys, dis is jus' a misunderstandin'..." he lied in sheer desperation. "I- I was actually jus' 'bout tuh call Paulie an'-"

Vinnie 'Ice Pick' immediately shushed the guy up, as he was absolutely not in the mood to listen to some bullshit after that footchase. "Shut up, Mr. Chedjou. Just shut the fuck up... We don't care what you were about to do or not about to do. We just want Mr. Marcano's money, and the sooner that you give it to us the sooner we can go our separate ways. Now where is it?..." he said with a growing tone of annoyance.

The captive drug dealer suddenly went quiet as he thought of trying to escape even with a busted knee. However, a hard hit onto his other kneecap from Vinnie 'Ice Pick''s lead pipe was enough to put that thought out of his mind. As Mamba screamed from a second broken kneecap, the two mobsters kept staring him down. There was absolutely no pity or mercy in their eyes.

"We can do this all fuckin' day, Mr. Chedjou! You've got plenty of bones that can break!" Vinnie 'Ice Pick' warned, raising the lead pipe again.

"If I were you I'd just give us what Mr. Marcano wants." Derek warned the drug dealer.

Mamba desperately tried to think of some sort of excuse, _any_ sort of excuse that he could use about what happened to Paulie's money. If he told Derek and Vinnie 'Ice Pick' where the money was then he more than likely wouldn't leave this alleyway alive. Unfortunately for him, Derek and Vinnie 'Ice Pick' were _not_ the patient types when it came to doing the dirty work for Paulie Marcano.

"Not gonna answer, huh? That's a _bad_ move, Mr. Chedjou... A _very_ bad move." Derek frowned at the continued silence from Mamba.

Wanting to try some classic intimidation this time rather than breaking bones, Vinnie 'Ice Pick' suddenly dropped the heavy lead pipe on the ground for now and he reached behind his back for something he had in his waistband. Mamba's fear greatly intensified as he watched Vinnie 'Ice Pick' pull out the origin of his nickname - a highly-customized ice-pick.

It was obvious that Vinnie 'Ice Pick' cared greatly for this tool-turned-weapon. The curved blackwood handle had a series of intricate gold and silver inlays, and the thin metal spike looked as if it was made of two different metals - part steel and part black titanium. The obsolete handtool certainly looked expensive to create...

In any event, Mamba was terrified at the sight of it. He had heard rumors over the years about some mobster who committed most of his kills with an ice pick, but he didn't think one of the guys chasing him was one and the same. Vinnie 'Ice Pick' had this guy exactly where he wanted him...

"So, here's how this is gonna work, Mr. Chedjou..." Vinnie 'Ice Pick' began as he crouched down next to his new captive. "Since you're being so uncooperative, this pick of mine's gonna go inside of ya. But the twelve-thousand-dollar question is gonna be _where_ inside of ya..."

The Moretti Family soldato then touched Mamba with the tip of his ice pick and he gently dragged it down the length of his face, all the way to his neck. The drug dealer flinched at the sudden cold contact of the metal on his skin.

"Y'know, the jugular vein is where I usually go, Mr. Chedjou. I know from trial and error that it's pretty effective." Vinnie 'Ice Pick' commented as the tip of the ice pick lightly pressed against Mamba's neck. "From what I hear, getting shanked in the neck hurts like a _bitch._ But you'll bleed out so quick that it won't matter... A couple of minutes is all it'll take but there's gonna be a _lot_ of blood. Y'know, now that I think about it, I should've brought one of those butcher's gowns..."

Mamba was clearly terrified at the thought of Vinnie 'Ice Pick''s words, but Derek was struggling not to laugh. To him, it truly seemed like Vinnie 'Ice Pick' was getting better and better with this intimidation stuff each time he does it to someone. Lord knows that his friend has had so much practice over the years... although to be fair, he saw his buddy kill quite a few people with that ice pick too, so maybe he wasn't _that_ good.

Suddenly, Vinnie 'Ice Pick' moved the ice pick away from his captive's neck and he brought it down to his crotch, pressing the tip of it against his jeans. "Or how about I turn your balls into a fuckin' kebab, Mr. Chedjou?... I'm not really into that whole _'eating a guy's balls'_ type of shit, but I do know a couple of _really_ sick motherfuckers from my old cell block at Rikers Island who love the taste of dark, Jamaican meat like yours..."

Now_ that_ threat finally caused Mamba to break.

"Okay, okay! _Fuckin' 'ell!_ Okay! I- I understan' yo' point, bruddah'! I'll talk!" Mamba exclaimed. He knew that Vinnie 'Ice Pick' was being completely serious with his threats.

Satisfied, Vinnie 'Ice Pick' pulled his ice pick away from Mamba's neck and he stood up. He backed away from Mamba as well, allowing the drug dealer to take a moment or two to gather his bearings. Vinnie 'Ice Pick' and Derek didn't dare take their eyes off of this guy, though.

Finally after a few moments, Mamba looked up at the two men and he nervously shrugged. "I- I don' have yo' greens righ' now, bruddah." he admitted to them. "I- I was goin' to gets som' new equipmen' for me crystal lab down in Lon' Beach, b- but... but dis' Conway boi shows up at me supplier's spot..."

Mamba was terrified about how these two mobsters would take what he would say next, causing him to momentarily stop speaking. However, the impatient and angry looks from the two mobsters scared him back into talking once more.

"...h- him took all di' money, bruddah." Mamba finally admitted to the two men. "All of it. _Every laas' penny. _I- I try tuh tell dem dat di funds belong tuh Mr. Marcano, dat di funds neva mine! _But dem neva care!_ There did _nuttin'_ mi' cud' do..."

All of that money Paulie Marcano loaned Mamba was taken by the Conway Mob?

And Mamba just_ let_ them rob him?

_He didn't even try to put up a fight?!_

"J- Jus' gimme two more days, maybe three..." Mamba practically begged the two men for some more time to pay off his debt to their capo. "Mi' swear mi' will pay Paulie back all of him funds! Extra, even! _Mi swear!_" he offered. Of course he didn't have any extra cash and he probably won't have any for quite a while, but he was desperate and he was willing to say everything and anything to try to stay alive.

Needless to say, both Derek and Vinnie 'Ice Pick' were not happy to hear what happened to Paulie's money. Mamba's offers fell on deaf ears.

"There did nuttin' mi' cud' do, man!" Mamba added, his fear increasing at the mobster's silence. "_Wah did mi' suppose tuh do?!_ Fight a guy who had a gun pan him and-"

Suddenly, Vinnie 'Ice Pick' walked back to Mamba and he kicked him very hard right in the teeth. Mamba yelled at the contact and instantly fell onto his side, holding onto his now-ruined, now-bloody teeth as he groaned from the pain. Vinnie 'Ice Pick' was going to kick him in the face again, but Derek stopped him before he could. The guy had told them what they needed to know, so there was no reason to put him through any more pain.

...well, _mostly_ no more pain. Kinda. Not really.

To be honest, Mamba was in for a world of shit.

_It is what it is._

"Calm down, Mr. Chedjou, calm down... I believe you." Derek said down to the crippled drug dealer as he got Vinnie 'Ice Pick' to back a few steps away.

Mamba let out the breath he didn't realize he had been holding. He was relieved. Very relieved. The mobster said he believed him, so maybe he wasn't going to die here in some shitty New York alleyway? If he could convince these guys to give him a few more days to raise money to pay off Paulie's debt, then he could use that time to get the hell out of the city and go somewhere so far away that they'd never find him.

"Oh tank God man! _Tank God!"_ Mamba praised the lord for his survival. "Mi know dat yo' wudda si sum reason, an mi swear I-"

"Shut up, Mr. Chedjou. My friend here wasn't finished yet." Vinnie 'Ice Pick' interrupted Mamba with an annoyed glare.

Of course, Mamba went dead silent after Vinnie 'Ice Pick' interrupted him. The last thing he wanted was to piss off either of these mobsters. Now that Mamba had quieted down, Derek went back to what he was going to say.

"Now, Mr. Chedjou, just hold on for a few moments and let me speak, please." Derek said, not looking away from the captive drug pusher as he reached under his jacket for something. "Now, I said that _I_ believe you..." he trailed off from his sentence.

That's when Derek pulled out the thing from under his jacket - a silver .45 caliber handgun with white pearl grips. Mamba's eyes widened with horror as Derek showed him the pistol in his hand. He had lied to him. His fate was sealed since the moment he told them that the money was gone.

"_...but my M1911 doesn't._"

The look of sheer terror on Mamba's face was enough to make Vinnie 'Ice Pick' start to laugh, but Mamba never got the chance to beg for his life or to even say anything else. Without warning, Derek had raised his pistol and he shot Mamba right in the neck, sending the Jamaican druggie down onto the ground as a great deal of blood began to pour out from his new gunshot wound. He must've hit an artery...

Mamba desperately held his hands to his throat as he began bleeding out in that dirty, dark alleyway, but Vinnie 'Ice Pick' and Derek didn't bother to stick around for the show. They didn't get what they came for, and now was the time to head back to Staten Island to give Paulie the bad news.

Derek and Vinnie 'Ice Pick' turned around and abandoned Mamba to his gruesome fate. The two of them began to head back in the direction that they chased Mamba through but even so they had a bit of a walk to get back to their car parked over on Butler Place. They knew that Paulie was pretty anxious to get his money back, but since his money was already gone they knew that Paulie was going to be _very_ pissed off.

"Paulie's _not_ gonna be happy about this one, dude..." Derek sweatdropped a bit as he thought of how angry his capo could get sometimes.

"That's an understatement..." Vinnie 'Ice Pick' sighed. "I can't fuckin' believe that prick gave Paulie's money to the Conways. Do you really think he was robbed?"

Derek snorted at the question. "You kiddin' me, Vinnie? Fuck no! Nah, that piece of shit probably tried to invest into some stupid side-business of theirs with Paulie's money and they decided to pocket the cash. The Conways are Irish trash but they're damn good at manipulating idiots like him, I'll give them that."

Even as they left the alleyway the two could still hear Mamba choking on his own blood as he bled out. It wouldn't be long before some good samaritan would check out the noises and find him, but by then the two mobsters would both be long gone.

Vinnie 'Ice Pick' didn't say it himself, but a part of him had a very bad feeling about leaving Mamba bleeding out alive back there even with his assured death sentence. They probably should have just put a bullet in his eye instead of the neck. It would've left absolutely no doubt behind about Mamba, and it also would've sent about as much of a message as the bullet in the neck did.

Anyway, it was probably best not to dwell on it. Mamba was practically a fountain thanks to the blood he was losing back there. It was more than likely that he'd die in that alleyway long before the EMTs would get to him. By next week it'll be old news, the Moretti's would move their focus towards the Conway Mob, and that son of a bitch Mamba will be rotting away in the ground somewhere.

What was the worst that could happen?

* * *

Lucy Moretti hummed an old Italian tune to herself as she scrubbed the dishes in the kitchen sink. At the moment she was by herself since her husband was out attending to some family business, so she was really just passing some time by doing a few chores here and there until he'd get back and he could take her to Broadway like he promised to do. She had the television on so that she could listen to the news and stave off boredom.

She temporarily stopped washing the dishes so that she could open the window behind the sink, allowing some fresh air to pour into the room. Feeling very satisfied by this, Lucy turned up the volume on the little TV she and Ray kept in the kitchen and she listened as she went back to washing the dishes.

"-and now we're back with our own Emily Woodward reporting live outside of St. Thomas's Hospital in London. Emily?"

"Thanks Chet." the reporter replied to the anchorman. "I come to you now with report from London on the first confirmed case of the 'Siberian Flu' outside of Russian borders. The patient, rumored to be a 95-year old man named Frank Griffiths - a former Royal Air Force captain and World War II veteran - was admitted to St. Thomas's five hours ago after he suddenly collapsed in Trafalgar Square while attending the 'British-American Unity' speech that was given by First Lady Catherine Resnick today. His condition was termed as 'critical'."

"What else can you tell us about this case, Emily? Is there any more word from St. Thomas's about the patient?"

Lucy blinked at the mention of the sickness suffered by that poor old man in England. She had felt mildly concerned about the virus ever since she first heard about it on the news a couple of days ago, but so far it seems like it hasn't hit New York City yet - let alone the U.S. at all. Just Russia so far and now apparently England as well. Hopefully it would stay that way and it'd just be someone else's problem to solve overseas.

"Well Chet," the reporter continued. "Hospital authorities are keeping a tight lip about the patient's condition, and it is still not known as to how he came to be infected by the virus. Officials of Public Health England has been informed of the incident and they have since urged all British citizens home and abroad to wash their hands, keep sanitary, and to consider social distancing for the foreseeable future."

Setting a cleaned-dish in the cupboard, Lucy decided to take a break for a few minutes so that she could be more focused on the news. She took a cigarette out of a pack she had laying on the counter and she lit it up, taking a long drag as she went to lean against the kitchen table. Lucy took another long drag on her cigarette as her vision settled on the television screen.

"So far it is unknown as to how many people the patient has come into contact with throughout the day nor is it known exactly how long he has been infected with the virus, but health officials in the United Kingdom are going to continue to monitor the situation until further notice." The reporter said before she smiled at the camera. "I'm Emily Woodward reporting live from Trafalgar Square for AMC News. Back to you, Chet."

"Thanks, Emily. Let's hope that the patient gets back to full health soon."

As the news anchor went on to report some other news story for that day, Lucy suddenly heard the front door open and shut. The mob boss's wife put out her cigarette in a nearby ashtray and she headed for other room, anxious to greet her husband after being separated from him all day.

However, Lucy suddenly froze in place when she saw how her husband appeared.

Ray awkwardly stared back at his wife as he quietly stood in the entrance hall. The look on Ray's face reminded Lucy of that of a puppy who had done something to upset his owner, and that thought actually wasn't too far off from the real thing since Ray was caked in the blood of another man. His shirt, his jacket, his pants, his shoes, his face, his hair, his hands... Of course, Ray didn't dare say a word to his wife about how this came to be.

What had happened was that Ray had a 'disagreement' with a few business owners out in Port Chester who were refusing to pay protection money to the Moretti Family. One thing led to another during their (not so) calm discussion, and now one of those stubborn business owners is permanently retired, and the rest of them were so terrified that they would've practically sold their own daughters to pay for protection. It is what it is, right?

However, Lucy was annoyed. _Very_ annoyed. She bad been through this kind of bullshit before - her husband gets a little too hotheaded during family business, and then she misses out on something he promised her. A dinner date, a relaxing massage, a honeymoon back in Romagna, a walk in Central Park, and now a Broadway show... You can't take your wife out after beating people half to death, right?

But she was damn sure going to make him make it up to her. Again.

A somewhat-unnerved Ray watched as his wife approached him with a frown on her face. He half-expected to get yelled at, but surprisingly she didn't do such a thing. In fact, all she really did was just hold out her hand to him.

"Give me your clothes. I'll get rid of 'em..." Lucy insisted to her husband with a noticable hint of frustration in her voice. "Head upstairs and get yourself cleaned up. You know where the towels and shampoos are. I hung up some clean clothes in our closet about an hour or two ago, so you can find something in there to wear after you're done." she instructed.

Ray could tell that his wife was in no mood for any of this nonsense of his, so he began to take his bloody clothes off without a second thought. He truly did feel bad about not being able to keep his promise to Lucy. But being a mob boss had just as many downsides as it had benefits...

Soon, Ray was as naked as the day he was born and he was holding a bundle of bloody clothing in his hands. Lucy had went into the kitchen and she came back out with a trashbag to dispose of her husband's clothes. Thanks to her husband and the life he led, she's had plenty of experience with disposing of evidence.

As his wife opened the bag, Ray dumped his bloody clothes down into it. "I know you're upset, Luce, but I promise I'll take ya out to Broadway tomorrow and wherever else you wanna go. We'll have our own day together and stuff like this won't get in the way..."

Lucy scowled at her husband, but the expression gradually faded away more and more as he spoke. She was rightfully pissed off by what he had done during family buisness, but she knew she couldn't stay mad at him - especially with him standing bare-ass naked right in front of her. But for now he was going to have to get cleaned up, and he was _definitely_ sleeping on the couch tonight.

"Damn right you'll take me out tomorrow. If not, I'll show you _exactly_ how terrifying I can be." Lucy gave a warning to her husband as she tied up the bands on the trashbag. She was going to head out into the backyard to burn the thing. Thank God that it wasn't raining in Brooklyn.

Ray, suddenly a little scared of his wife, could only nod as he watched her walk away and head back towards the kitchen and to the back door. However, she stopped and turned to look back at her husband. "Oh, and we're having ossobuco for dinner tonight..."

And with that, Mrs. Moretti headed out the back door to toss away the garbage bag in the can they had out back. Ray, greatly unnerved by her threat to show him 'exactly' how terrifying she can be, decided to just leave her alone for the time being. So, he hurried upstairs so that he can take his shower and get himself cleaned up enough to have dinner with his (scary) wife.

He_ loved_ this woman.

* * *

After their movie ended, Henry and Ashley threw out what little of the remaining popcorn was left that they didn't eat and they headed back out into the streets under Henry's umbrella. The movie wasn't nearly as great as Ashley hoped it would, be but she still had a very fun time with Henry today. He was definitely worth a second date and many more after that to boot.

The new couple made their way through West 42nd Street and back towards Times Square. Ashley didn't own a car since traffic was a nightmare in New York City, and Henry left his back in Brooklyn for a similar reason. They both met to take the M-Line train from Brooklyn's Myrtle Avenue–Broadway Station over to a station on Sixth Avenue in Manhattan, and they were going to take the same line back to their home borough together.

As they walked back into Times Square, Henry and Ashley realized that they still had some time before their train was due at the station on Sixth. They decided to simply find somewhere to sit and relax for now until their train would get to the station. Times Square was completely packed at that time though, so it soon became a challenge to find anywhere with two free chairs for them to sit on.

But as they started looking around for somewhere to sit, they drew the attention of more than one person.

_"Hey! Mr. De Luca!"_ the couple suddenly heard a gruff voice call out.

Ashley and Henry turned to see that there was two gruff-looking men that were approaching them through the huge crowds of people. One of the men was wearing a baseball cap that had an Irish tricolor patch on it, but Ash wasn't concerned at all by that. However, Henry was, as he saw the patch and instantly recognized the heavy Irish accent in that guy's voice. These two guys had to be part of the Conway Mob...

The two Irishmen stopped just a few feet away from where Henry and Ashley were standing. To protect her from these Irish guys, Henry went to stand in front of Ashley, causing her to feel even more confused about what was happening. She had no clue how dangerous these bastards could be. But Henry did understand, and he absolutely wasn't going to let her get hurt because of the life he lived.

"Hey, Ash...?" Henry began, not daring to look away from the two Conway goons for even a moment. "Look, how about you go and get us somethin' to drink at one of the food stands 'round here? I'll catch up with you in a sec, I promise..."

Ashley felt extremely confused by what was happening. It didn't take a genius to see that these two guys meant trouble, but why were they so interested in Henry? "Huh? Wait, you want me to get drinks? But... who are these guys, Henry?"

Henry continued staring down the Irishmen. "A couple of 'friends' of mine, that's all... I'll catch up with you in a couple of minutes, I promise..."

One of the Irish goons glared at Ashley and the expression on his face was enough to greatly unnerve her. It was clear that these two people weren't friends with Henry, but she reluctantly did as he said and she went to get him and herself a couple of drinks.

As Ashley left them, Henry was left alone to deal with the two Irishmen. But what exactly did they want from him? Did they wanna kill him? No, wait, it couldn't be anything like that. The crowds in Times Square provided far too many witnesses for a murder. If they weren't here to whack him, then what the fuck did they want from him? Whatever the case, Henry had a .38 on him all of the time. He was prepared to use it if he really needed to.

"'Bout time we found ya, Mr. De Luca. We've been looking for ya for hours now." the Irishman wearing the hat told him.

Henry rolled his eyes at what he was hearing. The Conways were already a huge annoyance and the last thing he needed was to have them trying to find him. "Oh, now what does a pair of Irish micks want with little ol' me?" he asked with a very sarcastic tone of voice.

"Cut the bullshit, Mr. De Luca." the other Irishman frowned at the Moretti soldato.

The Irishman wearing the hat frowned at Henry and he reached inside of his jacket for something. Henry immediately reached for the gun he had in his waistband, making sure to show it to the two Irishmen so that they knew he meant business. The two Irishmen didn't even flinch. Luckily for Henry, the Irishman only pulled a pack of cigarettes out from under his jacket. Henry's hand went away from his gun soon after.

Lighting up a cigarette for himself and another for his friend, the Irishman in the hat also offered one to Henry. Henry declined. His dad passed from lung cancer fifteen years ago and that was enough of a lesson to keep him away from that shit.

The Irishman with the hat put the pack back under his jacket. "Our boss sent us. We notice you Morettis've been pretty busy lately... Y'know, what with our warehouse in Yonkers and our missing pal Daniel Pearse..."

"I've got no idea what you're talking about, pal..." Henry lied, giving a casual shrug.

"Of course you don't..." the other Irishman said with a growing annoyance. "Look, we're here to give you, your boss, and the rest of you greaseballs a message: _Back the fuck off_. Otherwise thing'll start getting pretty fuckin' bad for all of yous Moretti rats... including for that pretty little girl over there..." he said, gesturing towards Ashley.

As the three of them talked, a very concerned Ashley was watching the scene from a nearby food court. Should she call the police? Neither Henry or the other two guys were doing anything even remotely violent. Something deep in her gut told her that those two men meant trouble. Henry was definitely hiding something from her... but what could it even be? When the Irishman pointed over to her, her stomach dropped.

When he heard the threat from the Irishman, Henry's expression changed from annoyed to completely pissed off. These Irish drunkards were going to _threaten_ him? _A made man?!_ His_ Family_?! _Don Moretti_ himself?! You _DON'T_ threaten the Family or its people like this and expect to get away with it...

But to threaten Ashley too...? Henry has whacked people for a hell of a lot less... These two motherfuckers were _very_ lucky that they were out in public.

"Listen here, you Gaelic pieces of trash..." Henry growled as one of his fists balled up hard. "Go back up to the Bronx. Go back to whatever shithole you came from up there. Go straight to your boss at that shitty little bar he owns, and tell him that he's gonna be in a world of shit if he tries anything against the Moretti Family." he threatened the pair of Irishmen.

Henry was so damn tempted to shoot the pair for their threats to his girlfriend. By sheer willpower he held himself back. "And I swear to God if you lay a _finger_ on that woman, I'll make sure your buddy Pearce has some friends to join him... You understand, cocksuckers? Stay away from that girl or I'll burn your whole goddamned borough to the ground..." he warned them both. He wasn't going to have her suffer the consequences of his way of life.

The two Irishmen were unfazed. But they did what they came here to do, so now was the time to head back to Mr. Conway. One of the Irishmen didn't say a word as he turned and walked away, but the other Irishman grinned at Henry and pointed at him with two fingers... almost as if he was aiming a gun.

"You won't see the last of us, greaseball..." the Irishman bid a not-so-fond farewell to Henry.

"I'm countin' on it, you fuckin' bog-trotter..." Henry retorted with a deep glare on his face.

The Irishman simply laughed away Henry's retort and he hurried off to join his friend. Henry was going to have to tell Ray all about what had just happened with the Irish, but he had to make sure Ashley was okay first. God, who knew what was going through her head right now...

Holding a couple of bottles of water in her hands, Ashley watched Henry walk over to her. He looked awkward, even a tad bit ashamed due to her witnessing what had happened. He was probably worried about if he had scared her or not. She was still feeling pretty confused and pretty unnerved, but not once did she truly feel scared of either of those assholes.

"Sorry 'bout that, Ash..." Henry apologized to his girlfriend as she handed him one of the bottles of water. "I, uh... things got a bit heated between me and my friends back there, but we're all fine now. Nothin' to worry about..." he lied in an effort to ease her.

"'Nothin' to worry about'? Henry, at one point you all looked like you were going to kill each other." Ashley deadpanned.

Henry had no idea what he could say to her, so he went dead quiet. His silence being an answer for now, Ashley simply dropped the issue for the moment. Admittedly neither of them felt too safe here in Times Square anymore, so they decided to walk and get to the train station over on Sixth and wait for their train to Brooklyn. Both of them just wanted to go home.

Henry hoped that he didn't lose Ashley over this nonsense...

* * *

Paulie Marcano was a _very_ unhappy man right now.

Having just finished working on a beautiful cherry-red 1968 Chevy Camaro for one of his longtime Jersey customers, Paulie had gotten a phone call from Vinnie 'Ice Pick' and he was told everything that happened with Mamba. The lost money, his death - everything. The Moretti capo got so pissed at the news his money was gone that he stupidly kicked the nearest thing to him without even checking to see what it was beforehand.

The thing he kicked just so happened to be the incredibly heavy car hoist that was holding up the Camaro.

The damn thing was made of solid steel.

It. Fucking. _Hurt._

Thanks to the bad news and the newfound pain in his foot, Paulie became even more pissed off. In fact, he didn't even bother to say goodbye as he hung up on Vinnie 'Ice Pick'. After he hung up on his soldato, Paulie limped his way to his office in the back of his scrapyard's garage. It didn't feel like any bones in his foot were broken but it still hurt like a bitch. He seriously needed to learn to keep his temper in check whenever shit like this happens.

Paulie reached into the mini-fridge next to his desk and he grabbed the ice-pack that he kept stored in its freezer for just such an occasion. He wrapped an old white washrag around it and then he pressed the coldness against his foot. He hissed at the contact, but after a couple of moments it finally started to sooth the pain that he was feeling. He was still incredibly pissed off though.

_Twelve-fucking-thousand dollars..._ All of it given to the Conway Mob by that lowlife piece of shit Mamba. Paulie already had suspicions about that guy beforehand. He knew he shouldn't have trusted that cocksucker with his money... Derek and Vinnie 'Ice Pick' did good in ending him like how they did.

But even so, the fact that remained was that the Conways had insulted him. That wasn't Mamba's money that they took, that was_ his_ money that he had loaned to Mamba. It didn't matter if it was twelve thousand dollars or twelve cents. It belonged to _him,_ and by extension it also belonged to Don Ray Moretti himself. This was something that simply couldn't be allowed to stand. The whole Family's honor was at stake now...

With a sigh, Paulie took out one of his drop phones out of his desk and he dialed up the number to one that he knew Ray kept in his house. He figured that the don would know what to do about the Conways. It took a couple of rings but eventually he heard his don answer the phone.

"Hey, Paulie. To what do I owe the pleasure of your call tonight?" Ray asked from the other line, having just finished having dinner with his wife.

"Gerald Conway." Paulie answered, cringing a bit as he moved his ice pack to another part of his foot. "That fucker's boys robbed me of twelve grand, Ray. Stole it all from some idiot I loaned the money too..."

The Moretti capo heard an angry-sounding groan come from his boss. "You've gotta be fuckin' kidding me, Paulie... Christ, first there was that thing that happened with Henry, and now there's this nonsense?!" his boss said as if he couldn't believe it.

"Huh? Wait, what happened with Henry? Is he okay?"

"You didn't hear?" Ray asked. "A couple of Conway's micks found him durin' his date with what's-her-name from Sinner's Palace. He's okay, they didn't hurt either of 'em, but from what Henry said they started makin' what sounded like threats to him, to me, and to the whole Family..."

Paulie was taken aback by what he heard about Henry. If those mick bastards were willing to threaten a made man out on the street like this, then Gerald Conway was definitely growing more bold than he first thought. Those Irish were playing with a fire that they absolutely didn't understand...

"Well... what do we do, boss? Want me to send some of my guys to the Bronx and hit 'em where they live?" Paulie cautiously inquired to his boss.

"No, nothin' like that. At least not yet." Ray replied. He wanted to avoid a full-blown mob war, at least for as long as he possibly could. "Look, I've got an idea that I've been thinking on for a few weeks, but now seems like a good time to see if it can work. It'll take a couple of phone calls to some associates of mine, probably one or two favors, but I think I know how we can deal with Gerald Conway. Just give me a couple of days to get it all organized." he explained.

"Fair enough, Ray." Paulie sighed. Irish blood wouldn't be spilled today, it seemed. At least Paulie was a patient man...

With that, Ray and Paulie both bid each other a good night and they ended their phone call. Paulie took his drop phone and snapped it in half so that it couldn't be traced, and then he tossed its remains into the garbage can he kept in the corner of the room. The poor, pained Moretti capo then decided to head home for the day so that he can nurse his hurting foot and finish up that marathon of Gunsmoke he had recorded on his TV last night.

God willing, Gerald Conway would be in a world of shit soon enough.


End file.
